PEG ALONG 

BY 
GEORGE L. WALTON, M.D. 




Class JE: 

Book 

GoEyrightN? : 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSITS 



PEG ALONG 




Painted by Benj . Wilson in 1759. Taken from Franklin's home in 
Philadelphia by Major John Andre in 1778 and carried to England 
by Sir Charles Grey. Presented to the United States at the Franklin 
Bicentennial in 1906 by Earl Grey, Governor-General of Canada. 
Now hanging in the White House, Washington. Reproduced from 
Franklin's Autobiography by courtesy of Houghton Mifflin Company. 



PEG ALONG 



BY 
GEORGE LINCOLN WALTON, M.D. 

t> 
CONSULTING NEUROLOGIST 
TO THE MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL; AUTHOR OF "WHY 
WORRY," "THOSE NERVES," AND "THE FLOWER FINDER" 



Truths that the theorist could never reach 
And observation taught me, I would teach. 

COWPER 




PHILADELPHIA & LONDON 
J. B. LIPPLNCOTT COMPANY 



# 






COPYRIGHT, I9IS. BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 



PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER, IQI5 



PRINTED BY J. B T.IPPINCOTT COMPANY 

AT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA, U. S. A. 



i 



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QGT 18ISI5 
&CLA41418S 



TO 
CRISPIN AND CRISPIANUS 

INDUSTRIOUS SAINTS OF SOISSONS 

BORN TO THE PURPLE 

THEY MADE SHOES FOR THE POOR 

AND PEGGED THEIR LIVES AWAY 

WITHOUT 

UNFAVORABLE COMMENT 



PREFACE 

The aim of the educational method 
in mind-training is four fold. The 
first step is to impress the individual 
with the need of such training, the 
second to stimulate his desire for bet- 
terment, the third to make clear to 
him the nature and bearing of his 
faulty mental habits, the fourth to 
show him how they may be modified. 
The main obstacle in the way of this 
accomplishment is the attitude of the 
individual regarding his own mental 
status. However ready he may be to 
acknowledge poor memory, defective 
mathematical ability or weakened 
power of application, he balks at al- 
lowing, even to himself, that he is 
querulous, cranky and unreasonable. 
Each display of these characteristics, 
obvious and pitiful though it may be 
to the outsider, is amply justified in 



PREFACE 

his own eyes by the peculiarly aggra- 
vating nature of the attending cir- 
cumstances. To explain the bearing of 
faulty habits, and offer suggestions 
for their relief to one who denies their 
existence is labor wasted. 

This book, a continuation of prior 
efforts in the same direction, is offered 
in the hope that something in lighter 
vein will prove of value in a field 
where its own weight handicaps the 
ponderous treatise. 

George L. Walton. 

Boston, 1915. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Introduction 11 

II. Managing the Mind 18 

III. The Methods of Bacon and Franklin . . 32 

IV. What Anyone Can Do 46 

V. Overinsistence 57 

VI. Approbativeness 87 

VII. Fret 99 

VIII. Fear 108 

IX. Playing the Martyr 117 

X. Living in the Present 129 

XI. Work and Play 149 

XII. Emotional Poise 162 

XIII. The Hypochondriacal Dredger 172 



PEG ALONG 

I 

INTRODUCTION 
NOT ALTOGETHER IN THE THIRD PERSON 

The first time I read tlie Waverley 
novels, I read them, prompted by a 
New England conscience, page by 
page, without a skip, from editor's 
note to index. In the introduction to 
the first of the series, I found a long 
description of the author's early his- 
tory and mental make-up : how fond 
he was already, as a youth, of fabulous 
invention, how prone to revery, and 
how desultory in his schooling, how 
he browsed at will in literary past- 
ures, with his appetite rather than 
his industry to thank that the cud 
achieved was worth the chewing. In 
my youthful ignorance I wondered 
11 



PEG ALONG 

why lie did not get on with his story. 
Since then I have learned that Sir 
Walter was right. Though he was 
still in doubt whether his books were 
ever to acquire distinction, he knew 
that if they were read at all the reader 
would wish to know what kind of a 
man it was who wrote them. 

This prevalent desire has been rec- 
ognized from the time of Ptah, bald- 
headed father of the gods, down to 
the successful mixer of chewing gum 
with pepsin, whose face, in vanishing 
perspective, is almost as familiar as 
the product of his genius. The por- 
traiture of the daily paper, whether 
verbal or pictorial, is in answer to 
the same demand. I remember the 
occasion when my father, having de- 
livered a public address, took up 
the morning edition, anxious to learn 
the criticism of his effort. All he 
found was that he was a short, 
pleasant-looking man, who wore a 
frock coat and striped trousers ! 
12 



INTRODUCTION 

Coming to my own case, one lady 
writes from a, distant state that she 
has read "Why Worry " — I hope I 
am not too boastful, perhaps she 
simply stumbled on it in the library 
— and writes to ask whether she cor- 
rectly reads between the lines that I 
am somewhat of a worrier myself. 
Again, only the other day, I met a 
lady who had had occasion to see much 
of me in earlier life. She said she 
had read my books with interest and 
was curious to know whether I was 
as fussy now as I was twenty-five 
years ago ! 

Taking these facts into considera- 
tion, I venture at the outset of this 
book to set at rest any doubt there 
may remain as to whether I am, or 
have been, a sharer in the faulty 
mental habits whose modification is 
attempted in my writings. It will 
perhaps cover the ground to repeat 
the answer I gave a certain lady who 
said, " I think you must have had me 

13 



PEG ALONG 

in mind when you wrote ' Why 
Worry.' " My answer was, "Why 
no, I had myself in mind." Still 
further to incriminate myself, I must 
relate what happened in the course 
of a certain meeting of the American 
Neurological Association. One of the 
sessions was held at the Baltimore 
Country Club. In the course of the 
afternoon my friend Dr. Dana and I 
decided to forego an hour of the pro- 
gram to get a glimpse of the flora in 
the vicinity. The taxicab was at the 
door about which I hovered, with one 
eye rudely fixed, I fear, upon the 
clock, while Dr. Dana paused to con- 
verse with a lady of his acquaintance. 
When he finally joined me he said the 
lady wanted to know who was his 
" little old nervous friend." "What 
did you tell her?" I asked. "I told 
her," he said with a smile, "it was the 
man who wrote ' Why Worry' !" 

After this confession I need only 
add that I give no advice to others 

14 



INTRODUCTION 

that I do not need myself, and that I 
offer no maxim for the aid of others 
that I do not have occasion myself to 
use may times in the day. It is from 
my own experience that I have 
learned to distrust the optimism of 
the average mental healer, as well as 
the overconfidence of the " cured. " 
For this reason I do not expect to 
annihilate the faulty mental habit, 
but only hope to curb it. That this 
alone is well worth while, I can also 
from my own experience testify. 

Not but there are those who claim 
to have been cured even by my modest 
efforts. I recently met a friend whose 
approach is always heralded by a 
clearing of the throat with a note 
peculiar to himself. "I have read, 
hm, hm, your book," he said, "and 
it has cured me, hm, hm, of all my 
nervous habits, hm, hm!" If I 
allowed myself to become puffed up 
by the praise of such readers my case 
would rival that of the inflated frog 

15 



PEG ALONG 

in the parable. I believe it was Dr. 
Griggs who warned his hearers that 
if all they did was to listen and ap- 
prove, his lectures had accomplished 
nothing, but that he would credit him- 
self with having done some good in 
the world if, on reaching home, some- 
body would just speak pleasantly to 
his aunt! 

A word about titles : I have been ac- 
cused of concealing otherwise worthy 
matter under titles bordering on the 
bizarre, but I can assure you that, 
whether they are good or bad, much 
thought has been spent in their selec- 
tion, as any writer of books will real- 
ize, for 

None but an author knows an author's cares, 
Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears. 

Nor is the christening least im- 
portant of the parental duties. In- 
deed, I have come to realize, as a 
better man has said, that a good name 
is almost as important in literature as 
in life. The present title, itself the 

16 



INTRODUCTION 

maxim I most often use for my own 
guidance in time of stress, is some- 
what in contrast with those which 
ornament the pages of my prior 
efforts. Those efforts were directed 
mainly toward the establishment of 
a " frame of mind." This title sug- 
gests rather what is to be done with 
our " frame of mind" now that we 
have attained it. 

On looking over the self -portraiture 
attempted in this introduction, I see 
that I have laid myself open to the 
comment that though I can steal the 
tools of others, it is not so easy to 
appropriate their power to handle 
them. This I cheerfully acknowledge, 
consoling myself with the old Scotch 
proverb, "They that mint at a gown 
of gold will always get a sleeve of it." 



II 

MANAGING THE MIND 

So shall I spring with joy to grasp the helm, 
Shall seize the sheet and sit the windward rail 
And feel the flick of motion on my face ; 
Nor fear the cresting waves that overwhelm, 
But crowd the very sky with spreading sail 
And venture all for victory in the race. 

Stephen Berrien Stanton 

If we should put into learning how 
to manage our minds a small fraction 
of the time we put into learning how 
to sail a boat, we should all be practi- 
cal philosophers. In this happy event, 
far from being foundered by the first 
stiff squall, we should proceed 
through life on an even keel, or at 
least on as even a keel as our circum- 
stances should warrant. Instead of 
studying the chart for a haven every 
time the barometer dropped we 
should take pleasure in our mastery 
of the elements, and rather be looking 
for a storm to test our seamanship. 

No one need learn to sail a boat un- 

18 



MANAGING THE MIND 

less he chooses, but everyone ought to 
learn something about running him- 
self, for he is launched, according to 
the time-honored figure of speech, 
upon the sea of life. He may be 
wafted indefinitely on by light and 
favoring breezes, or he may, per- 
chance, meet a hurricane sufficiently 
violent to baffle the expert, but it is 
likely that his experience will lie 
somewhere between these extremes. 
Is it not worth while, since we cannot 
step ashore, to put some time into a 
study of the ropes ? How does it avail 
us to bemoan the fact that our boat 
is leaking, cranky or oversparred ? 

Is it not the more to our credit that 
we can learn to do with such material 1 
In popular language, it is "up to us" 
to play the game, the more so when we 
realize that if we let go, 

The slack sail shifts from side to side, 
The boat, untrimmed, admits the tide, 

Borne down, adrift, at random tost, 
The oar breaks short, the rudder's lost. 
19 



PEG ALONG 

A pre-publicational reviewer warns 
me that the verse I have inserted is in 
danger of causing terror to the timor- 
ous, but it is no part of my plan to 
furnish feather beds for those to fall 
upon who cannot stand against the 
common exigencies. I have no faith 
in the method, too much in vogue, of 
assuring the fearful one there is no 
danger. This only aggravates timid- 
ity. The man who recognizes the fact 
that life is full of dangers is more 
likely eventually to cultivate the need- 
ful courage than the one whose insist- 
ence for absolute safety is catered 
to by the reassurance of his family, 
his friends, and his medical adviser. 

But to resume our place in the boat, 
which we seem to have left at the 
mercy of wind and tide, in spite of my 
statement that we could not step 
ashore, — there is this fundamental 
difference between running ourselves 
and sailing a boat: TKe landlubber 
is only too glad to have an old salt on 
20 



MANAGING THE MIND 

his weatherbeam who shall shout as 
occasion arises, "Drop your peak," 
"Let go your sheet," or "Put down 
your helm." When it comes to man- 
aging ourselves, pride forbids accept- 
ance of another 's admonition. Nor 
does the pertinence of his suggestion 
lessen our resentment. Indeed, if it 
be a member of our own family who 
arrogates to himself the duties of in- 
structor in a branch of which we know 
he is himself not master, the fat is in 
the fire. The mere fact that he ad- 
vises us to drop our peak only makes 
us want to hoist it as high as Hainan 
and him higher yet. We may, how- 
ever, accept from a book the useful 
admonition, bearing in mind the fact 
that it is some friend who needs it, 
rather than ourselves. Even if we 
cast the book aside, we may, without 
endangering our self-respect, resume 
its study in a calmer mood ; we may 
even, on the quiet, for our own satis- 
faction, try a maxim or two that we 

21 



PEG ALONG 

would have been too proud to test at 
the insistence of another. 

Of course word-of -mouth instruc- 
tion, if acceptable, would be more apt, 
just as, when the lee rail is under 
water, the shout of warning is better 
than the perusal of the " Seaman's 
Friend, " yet I am assured by compe- 
tent authority that the conscientious 
reader of that volume will know more 
about a boat than before he took it up. 
But it would not occur to the most op- 
timistic that reading the book would 
make a sailor. Similarly, the trea- 
tises »on practical philosophy to be use- 
ful must be not skimmed, but studied. 

Philosophy is rather a large word 
to apply to the commonplace sugges- 
tions of such a book as this. Indeed, 
when minor ills are in question, the 
expression, " bring our philosophy to 
bear," reminds us of the inimitable 
Crothers, who somewhere speaks of 
using a sledge-hammer to drive a tack. 
For an immediate weapon, philosophy 

22 



MANAGING THE MIND 

is certainly unwieldy, not to say in- 
tangible. Hence the maxim, or other 
short saying, which shall carry the 
gist of the philosophy for the case in 
hand. These sayings, so they are 
pertinent, need neither be wise nor 
witty. Thus, suppose I find myself in 
the clutches of the " doubting folly, " 
brought to a standstill by indecision 
which task to take up first. If I 
say to myself, "Run, molasses!'' the 
admonition is a ready reminder of all 
the arguments that have been brought 
to bear on the faulty mental habit of 
indecision, namely, that it is better to 
take up the wrong task than to do 
neither ; that other people have made 
mistakes, why should not I; that it 
is better to make a mistake, which in 
nine cases out of ten is less important 
than we think, than to lose our way 
in the maze of doubt. "We can bring 
some such homely reminder to bear 
even if we fail to secure a handhold 
on philosophy. And if the reader can 

23 



PEG ALONG 

be led to accept and use some of my 
reminders or, better yet, invent and 
use maxims of his own, the main ob- 
ject of this book will be achieved. 

To give another illustration, — let us 
suppose one of our friends has the 
habit known as overinsistence, or, in 
every-day parlance, "chewing the 
rag," a not uncommon factor in pro- 
moting the mental unrest underlying 
nervous breakdown. The victim of 
this misfortune is so constituted that 
every subject he considers must be 
followed to its ultimate conclusion; 
every topic, however unimportant, 
must be threshed again lest a grain be 
overlooked. Once started on an argu- 
ment, he must not only have the last 
word, but the argument must be car- 
ried on in the privacy of his chamber 
until the last ghost is laid. This men- 
tal sufferer may learn to leave the 
objectionable line of thought at the 
right-about by some such maxim as, 
This junk is not worth sorting." 

24 



u 



MANAGING THE MIND 

Let me warn him that the maxim is 
intended, like most of my suggestions, 
strictly for home consumption. Un- 
less we are looking for trouble, it will 
be wise to avoid applying to the argu- 
ments of another the epithet "junk," 
whether sorted or unsorted, unless we 
are bigger than he or can run faster. 

The maxims furnish what there is of 
action in this book. That they are not 
utterly valueless, though sometimes 
crude, is attested by their adoption 
by others who have ventured into the 
field of popular medical literature. 

A word about the physical basis of 
the mind. The brain is the organ 
without which a man's thoughts could 
no more occur than could his digestion 
without an alimentary canal. You 
would doubtless be glad to know how 
nerve cells can produce thought. I 
would myself. I understand they do 
it by breaking down^ of higher into 
lower chemical complexes. I trust 
this satisfies your longing ; for myself 

25 



PEG ALONG 

I must confess I never could visualize 
the process, but such sentences no 
longer alarm me. I have come to 
realize that, like the electric van that 
thunders over the cross-walk, they do 
not go so fast as they make a noise ! 

But we can study, let us say, elec- 
tricity without knowing just what it 
is ; nor is it deemed rash to state that 
the generation of this force cannot be 
accomplished without physical means. 
Likewise, of the mind we can say the 
signs all point in one direction. When 
certain parts of the brain are lost, 
intellectual defects appear. From 
observations of this kind we conclude 
also that the various sensations are 
received in definite brain cells, while 
the motions stimulated by those sensa- 
tions originate in others. The inevi- 
table outcome of sensation is motion ; 
it is by our motions that others meas- 
ure our mental balance. So we can 
keep within our beat, our minds are 
within the normal, though our 

26 



MANAGING THE MIND 

thoughts wander far afield and cause 
much discomfort. It is our actions we 
are learning to control, as well as our 
thoughts, when we resolve to drop the 

. . . cumbrous cares that clog the mind, 
The self-inflicted worse than all combined, 

to shoulder the needful burden only, 
and to "peg along. " 

With the memories somehow stored 
up in these cells come the " fancies 
fond and false philosophy " of 
Matthew Arnold, the beginning of the 
mental tribulations which may affect 
unfavorably not only our thoughts but 
our behavior. In other words, here 
we have the making of self-inflicted 
martyrdom, of over-strenuous insist- 
ence to accomplish ends, of anger, fear 
and shame, the results of which cause 
more nervous breakdown than any 
amount of plain hard work. 

It may make the matter clearer to 
compare the nerve cells of the brain 
with the stars of the firmament. The 
brain contains certain large cells visi- 

27 



PEG ALONG 

Lie without liigh magnification; such 
are the cells presiding over motion. 
We may compare these with the stars 
which make the outlines of the well- 
known constellations. These stars are 
easily recognized, but through and be- 
yond are gathered such hordes of 
others as to present, for example, in 
the Milky Way, an apparently homo- 
geneous mass which may be resolved 
into individual stars, becoming more 
and more numerous as the strength 
of the telescope increases. These 
smaller stars would correspond with 
the brain cells which receive the sen- 
sations, general and special. To com- 
plete the analogy, let us imagine each, 
even of these invisible stars, connected 
with every other star by celestial 
wires, all storing up and comparing 
data and interchanging messages. 

Suppose, in continuation of our 
comparison, the stern pursuit of 
Scorpio by the Centaur Sagittarius 
represents the concerted action of the 

28 



MANAGING THE MIND 

heavenly bodies; that the deft pre- 
cision with which Aquarius pours the 
glistening contents of his jar into the 
waiting fauces of the Australian fish 
is due to the deliberate guidance of 
this vast assemblage, and that through 
its foresight, also 

With golden horns in full career 
The Bull beats down the barriers of the year. 

In such event it would be no cause 
for wonder if the arrow of the Cen- 
taur should sometime go astray, if the 
worm should turn at last and nip the 
paw so long extended toward him, if 
the fish should quit his post to gambol 
with the sea-monster of Andromeda, 
or chase a meteor across the sky in de- 
fiance of the firmamental schedule! 
In short, we should not be surprised 
if the celestial disorder paralleled that 
produced by Ingoldsby's devils, who 

Kissed the Virgin and filled her with dread, 
Who popp'd the Scorpion into her bed; 
Who stole the arrows of Sagittarius, 
Who broke the pitcher of poor Aquarius, 
And who skimmed the Milky Way. 
29 



PEG ALONG 

Within certain limits the vagaries 
of the human mind are likewise cause 
for no alarm. Even while striving 
for its control it need not astonish us 
to discover that silly impulse takes the 
place of sober thought — that intel- 
lectual will-o'-the-wisps lure us from 
our goal ideas ; that while recognizing 
the futility of our obsessions and the 
selfishness of our emotions, we follow 
their insistent sway in spite of better 
judgment. It is surprising rather, con- 
sidering the complexity of the guiding 
mechanism, that, on the whole, our 
thoughts and actions are so orderly. 

The implication that the mind can 
take part in its own control may be 
disputed on the ground of the aca- 
demic non-existence of free will. But 
the fact cannot be gainsaid, even 
though the theorist may be forced to 
the explanation of the pedagogue to 
whom the boy propounded the query: 

"Why do you punish me if it was 
foreordained that I should sin?" 

30 



MANAGING THE MIND 

"Because," replied the master, as 
he rolled up his sleeves, "it was fore- 
ordained also that you should get the 
worst whaling you ever had in your 
life, and here it is." 

On looking over this chapter I fear 
the reader may justly complain that 
I have whirled him into the heavens 
from the surface of the sea ; that I left 
him managing a boat and now ask 
him to manage the celestial spheres. 
Nor can I blame him if he hoist me 
by my own petard and say, "This 
junk is not worth sorting." In that 
event, if he "peg along" to the next 
chapter, it will be my consolation that 
he has assimilated the maxim, and my 
hope that he may on some occasion 
apply it likewise to some foolish fan- 
cies of his own. Furthermore, in 
answer to the question of managing 
the spheres I can truly say that learn- 
ing to manage the mind is largely a 
matter of learning to leave it alone. 



31 



Ill 

THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

There is always hope in the man who actually 
and earnestly works. In idleness alone there is per- 

^ " Thomas Carlyle 

I hope the reader will not assume, 
from my citing these strenuous work- 
ers, that I propose to make either a 
Bacon or a Franklin out of him. If 
his yearnings run to this length, he 
will have to consult some one whose 
philosophy is cast in a more heroic 
mold than mine. At the same time, 
even if we do not care to follow in the 
footsteps of such devotees of toil, it is 
always worth while to study the men- 
tal machinery of successful men, es- 
pecially if they have not been afraid 
to let in the public to see the wheels 
go round. This Franklin did in his 
Autobiography to an amazing degree. 
Bacon did the same, but indirectly, 

32 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

through our knowledge that he was 
himself the first to follow the advice 
he gave others regarding industry, 
mind management, and the regulation 
of conduct. 

Tales of genius, by appealing to our 
sense of the marvellous, may be more 
attractive than the story of system- 
atic endeavor, but the former may 
easily give rise to false ideals, ideals 
leading either to idle dreams, or to 
unwarranted discouragement over the 
fact that our equipment falls far short 
of genius. The earlier we learn that 
work is a more reliable attribute than 
genius, the sooner we shall lay a firm 
foundation for our own advancement. 
It is true that Bacon has been counted 
among the men of genius, but it is 
essentially to painstaking and unre- 
mitting toil that his high place in the 
land of letters and philosophy is due. 
The management of the mind he 
undertook, as he did everything else, 
somewhat on the lines of reducing 

3 33 



PEG ALONG 

cord wood to kindling. He put his 
back into it and sawed wood. 

A clue to the methods of this re- 
markable man may be obtained from 
his own observation: "A man that is 
young in years may be old in hours, if 
he have lost no time." Constitution- 
ally delicate, with a seriousness be- 
yond his years, he devoted himself, 
already in early life, to studies fitting 
those far older. At college he was im- 
patient of the limits of the curriculum 
and " departed, carrying with him a 
profound contempt for the course of 
study pursued there, a fixed convic- 
tion that the system of academic edu- 
cation in England was radically 
vicious, a just scorn for the trifles on 
which the followers of Aristotle had 
wasted their powers, and no great 
reverence for Aristotle himself." 
(Macaulay.) 

When a young courtier He made 
himself an authority on manners and 
customs, otherwise known as "Cere- 

34 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

monies and Respects. " Indeed, his 
conclusions have a rather pedantic 
sound when we consider his age, re- 
garding, for example, the proper and 
expedient bearing of the individual 
toward those lower, as well as those 
higher, in the social scale, thus: "If 
we do not render respect to superiors, 
can we expect inferiors to render re- 
spect to us? " 

In middle life, by assiduous effort, 
he made himself a finished speaker as 
well as a voluminous and effective 
writer. Nor did his final downfall 
interrupt his industry, for the works 
of his later life are perhaps his best. 

As an illustration of his careful at- 
tention to detail, after commenting, 
in his essay "Of Travel," on the fre- 
quent use of a diary by the voyager at 
sea, where nothing is visible but sky 
and water, and the neglect to take 
notes on land, he enumerates the 
things there to be observed and noted. 
The list commences with courts of 

35 



PEG ALONG 

princes and of justice, churches and 
monuments, walls and fortifications, 
and runs through a long list, to termi- 
nate with comedies, collections of 
jewels and robes, cabinets and rari- 
ties. He counsels changing one's 
lodging in foreign cities, the better to 
learn the ways of the people, and par- 
ticularly advises cultivating the ac- 
quaintance of the secretaries and 
employees of ambassadors "for so in 
traveling in one country he shall suck 
the experience of many." He even 
instructs the traveler in the ethics of 
the return, thus: "And let his travel 
appear rather in his discourse than in 
his apparel or gesture ; and in his dis- 
course, let him be rather advised in 
his answers than forwards to tell 
stories ; and let it appear that he doth 
not change his country manners for 
those of foreign parts, but only prick 
in some flowers of that he hath learned 
abroad into the customs of his own 
country." 

36 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

Nor were such admonitions purely 
academic. He was himself untiring 
in the acquisition of knowledge of 
every variety, and in studying how 
best to apply it. In other words, he 
subordinated everything to the culti- 
vation and management of his mind. 
He was thoroughly well aware that to 
be a continuous and effective worker 
and to preserve mental control, one 
must have a variety of interests. He 
did not deem it trivial to devote the 
same detailed study to the habits of 
plants that he did to the habits of men, 
thus, he says: "those which perfume 
the air most delightfully, not passed 
by as the rest, but being trodden upon 
and crushed, are three : that is, burnet, 
wild thyme, and water-mints. There- 
fore you are to set whole alleys of 
them, to have the pleasure when you 
walk or tread. " 

In the garden, that no moment 
might be wasted, his secretary was at 
hand to jot down thoughts for future 

37 



PEG ALONG 

use. His "Prormis" contains not 
only weighty observations for future 
use, but anecdotes, to be on call when 
needed for his writings or his conver- 
sation. His pungent sayings repre- 
sent no fireside philosophy, but the 
essence of an active life compressed 
and molded by a master hand. Nor 
was he satisfied when the work was 
done. It is said that his essays were 
ever by him for revision, one, indeed, 
being entirely rewritten for the last 
edition. 

A few quotations from the essays 
will be here in place as bearing on the 
subjects with which we have to do. 
Thus, the following remarks from the 
essays "Of Revenge" are peculiarly 
applicable to the matter of harboring 
the grudge : "Bevenge," he says, "is a 
kind of wild justice ; which the more 
man's nature runs to, the more ought 
law to weed it out. For as for the 
first wrong, it doth but offend the law ; 
but the revenge of that wrong putteth 

38 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

the law out of office. Certainly in 
taking revenge, a man is but even with 
his enemy ; but in passing it over, he 
is superior ; for it is a prince's part to 
pardon. And Solomon, I am sure, 
saith, It is the glory of a man to pass 
1)\) an offense . . . There is no man 
doth a wrong for the wrong's sake; 
but thereby to purchase himself 
profit, or pleasure, honor, or the like. 
Therefore why should I be angry with 
a man for loving himself better than 
me? And if any man should do 
wrong merely out of ill nature, why, 
yet it is but like the thorn or briar, 
which prick and scratch, because they 
can do no other. " 

On the question of living in the 
past, he says : "That which is past is 
gone, and irrevocable ; and wise men 
have enough to do with things present 
and to come; therefore they do but 
trifle with themselves, that labor in 
past matters/' 

On the question of emotional poise, 

39 



PEG ALONG 

the following observation is pecu- 
liarly apt when we remember that it 
was made during the period of his 
own fall from grace: "The virtue 
of prosperity is temperance ; the vir- 
tue of adversity is fortitude ; which in 
morals is the more heroical virtue. " 

On the management of the mind in 
general, he says: "A man's nature 
runs either to herbs or weeds ; there- 
fore let him seasonably water the one 
and destroy the other. " This figure 
was doubtless drawn from the horti- 
cultural pursuits of which he was so 
fond. His knowledge of real life, and 
his vital interest in it serve here as 
elsewere to make his message ring 
true. The training of the mind, like 
the care of a garden, is surely not the 
work of a single day, but rather a 
matter of constant vigilance. And in 
the mind, as in the garden, the blos- 
som and the fruit repay the toil. And, 
to further the comparison, a little 
attention bestowed in season is easier 

40 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

and more effective than postponed 
labor. 

It may be suggested that Bacon 
could afford to cultivate ail his talents 
and accomplish what he did, because 
he was born to the purple and did not 
have to make his living. Upon this 
question the life of Benjamin Frank- 
lin lets much light, since it shows that 
prolonged schooling is not necessary 
either for worldly success, as every- 
one knows, or for success in the realms 
of literature and practical philosophy, 
and the cultivation of the arts that go 
to make the statesman. His school 
years, in the ordinary acceptation of 
the word, were cut short at the age 
of ten. 

Fortunately, Franklin was not one 
of those who "are so close and re- 
served as they will not show their 
wares but by a dark light, and seem 
always to keep back somewhat. " 
"Whether on account of unusual hu- 
mility or, perhaps, as he himself sug- 

41 



PEG ALONG 

gests, because lie was proud of his 
humility, he did not hesitate to lay 
bare, for him who runs to read, the 
methods by which he trained his own 
mind and shaped his own career, once 
having accepted the dictum "It is 
practice alone that brings the powers 
of the mind, as well as those of the 
body, to their perfection." 

"It was about this time," he says, 
in his Autobiography, "I conceived 
the bold and arduous project of arriv- 
ing at moral perfection. I wished to 
live without committing any fault at 
any time; I would conquer all that 
either natural inclination, custom or 
company might lead me into." 

For this purpose he made a list of 
thirteen desirable virtues, among 
them temperance, order, resolution, 
industry, sincerity, meditation and 
tranquillity. In a little book, which he 
always carried with him, a page was 
allotted to each of these virtues, and 
in this book he kept a daily score of 

42 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

his conduct, paying special attention 
to one virtue one week, another the 
next, and so on through the list. The 
year's work embraced, then, four 
courses of thirteen weeks each. 

"When we are inclined to think that 
we have made a complete &tudy of the 
management of our minds, we may 
perhaps come to realize that our trial 
has not been exhaustive, when we read 
the following. " After a while I went 
thro' one course only in a year, and 
afterwards only one in several years, 
till at length I omitted them entirely, 
being employed in voyages and busi- 
ness abroad, with a multiplicity of 
affairs that interfered; but I always 
carried my little book with me." 

For our consolation when, after we 
have really tried, we find ourselves 
falling short, we may read Franklin's 
comment on his tardy acquisition of a 
certain virtue. Of this virtue, he 
says, "I was almost ready to give up 
the attempt, and content myself with 

43 



PEG ALONG 

a faulty character in that respect, like 
the man who, in buying an ax of a 
smith, my neighbor, desired to have 
the whole of the surface as bright as 
the edge. The smith consented to 
grind it bright for him if he would 
turn .the wheel ; he turned, while the 
smith pressed the broad face of the 
ax hard and heavily on the stone, 
which made the turning of it very 
fatiguing. The man came every now 
and then from the wheel to see how 
the work went on, and at length 
would take his ax as it was, without 
further grinding. 'No,' said the 
smith; 'turn on, turn on; we shall 
have it bright by and by ; as yet, it is 
only speckled.' 'Yes,' says the man, 
'but I think I like a speckled ax 
lest/ " 

It would appear that, whereas 
Bacon, in the practical application of 
his philosophy, was merely developing 
his natural trend, Franklin was mak- 
ing himself over. He definitely states, 

44 



THE METHODS OF BACON AND FRANKLIN 

for example, that his efforts to elim- 
inate the trivial from his conversa- 
tion were directed towards a habit of 
" prattling, punning and joking/' 
which he thought was making him 
acceptable to trifling company only. 

Far from becoming the prig his 
efforts would suggest, he retained 
throughout enough of his natural self 
to make him a genial companion 
and a staunch friend. Although he 
planned from the outset to accumulate 
enough of this world's goods to place 
him above the reach of want, he never 
stifled the generosity which led him to 
loan money to impecunious friends at 
a time when he might easily have re- 
sponded with the plea that he himself 
was poor. In short, the net result in 
Franklin's case was a very human 
product. 



IV 

WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 
No one is free who commands not himself. 

Epictetus 

A certain amount of mental train- 
ing is both desirable and easy, but 
unless we happen to feel the impulse 
to strive for perfection, as did 
Franklin, it is hardly advisable that 
his plan in its entirety be followed. 
This is especially true of the person 
who is already endowed with the New 
England Conscience. This individ- 
ual, while cheerfully acknowledging 
himself the chief of sinners, is so in- 
tolerant of criticism that when his 
attention is called to the most trifling 
of his real shortcomings, he either 
flies into a rage or seeks the solitude 
of his chamber. It is to be feared 
that the good resolutions of such an 
one would be swamped at the outset 

46 



WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 

by the very elaborateness of the 
method. On the one hand, he would 
become too easily discouraged by the 
multiplicity of his faults, or, on the 
other, he would juggle with his con- 
science for the sake of lessening his 
score, only to be worried in turn by 
the realization that he had been dis- 
honest with himself. 

In point of fact, for the average 
individual, and particularly for the 
overconscientious, a little of Frank- 
lin's method will go a long way. For 
example, it may be practical, at the 
outset at least, to replace our vague 
resolutions by some definite plan allied 
to that of Franklin. Thus, we may find 
it useful to try keeping score for a 
time of one or two of our faulty habits 
in place of his thirteen. This will 
serve to fix our attention, and make 
it easier for us, when we take up the 
more elaborate habits, to continue the 
game without the pencil. By com- 
mencing in this way, we are following 

47 



PEG ALONG 

the old admonition, "Proceed from 
the known to the unknown," itself a 
maxim we may sometimes find useful 
to help us bring our scattered wits to 
work upon the scheme of life. We 
might jot down, in the notebook we 
carry in our waistcoat pocket, the 
most glaring of our faulty nervous 
habits, and against it make a mark 
each time we succumb. If we are 
approximately honest in our score, we 
shall be astonished, in the first place, 
to see how many marks we shall accu- 
mulate, and later shall be agreeably 
surprised to see how rapidly the num- 
ber lessens. 

Let us suppose our attention has 
been called to the fact that we clear 
our throats much oftener than is need- 
ful. We decide the habit worth ex- 
terminating, not only in the way of 
general training, but because it de- 
tracts from the pleasure our society 
gives to others. So familiar have we 
become with the peculiar note we 

48 



WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 

utter in this connection that we are 
quite unconscious of the sound. But 
let us write down C. T. on the left- 
hand side at the top of a page in our 
little book. The chances are that a 
minute has not elapsed before we real- 
ize we have cleared our throat, neces- 
sitating a mark. It will not be at all 
surprising if in another three minutes 
we find we must make another mark, 
and if at the end of fifteen minutes we 
have made a round half dozen. By 
this time we begin to realize what an 
impression we have been making on 
our neighbors. Already a tendency to 
restrain the habit will have been 
established, and in the next fifteen 
minutes, for the first time in a dozen 
years, we shall only clear our throats 
once. The next day we start a fresh 
line, and are likely to surprise our- 
selves by an aggregate of only a dozen 
marks for the entire day, a number 
perhaps halved on the third day, and 
reduced to two or three on the fourth. 

4 49 



PEG ALONG 

We now deem ourselves practically 
cured, and the next day neglect our 
score. At this point comes the dan- 
ger of a relapse, and if we renew our 
score the day after, we are likely to 
find the marks increased to a dozen; 
and now commences the real and last- 
ing improvement. 

In a similar manner, we may prac- 
tise our self-control on habits of 
drumming, tapping the foot, sniffing, 
pulling the whisker, " pushing the 
face, ' ' pulling out the watch every few 
minutes, and like simple habits, all 
easily lessened, sometimes even eradi- 
cated, by a little definitely applied 
attention. 

Some of these habits can be cured 
more readily than others. Among the 
more difficult come those in which the 
nervous movement is made to relieve 
a sensation, for example, friction to 
relieve itching. If we can restrain 
this desire we shall have made a dis- 
tinct advance in control of our nerves, 

50 



WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 

for we shall shortly find that the itch- 
ing itself will lessen. In fact, after 
eliminating the obvious causes for this 
sensation, as the bite of the mosquito, 
we are left with a purely nervous phe- 
nomenon in which the mind is largely 
concerned. This is illustrated by the 
fact that as I dictate this sentence the 
right side of my nose begins to itch, 
a sensation which speedily jumps to 
my left ear. Experiment has con- 
vinced me that if I rub these parts the 
sensation will spread, but if I refrain, 
it will speedily disappear. To men- 
tion an immediate benefit of this 
training, it will help us to endure, 
without scratching, the very real and 
severe itching of ivy poisoning, thus 
preventing aggravation and extension 
of the malady. 

It may be asked at this point what 
is the practical advantage, aside from 
such a trifling one as I have just men- 
tioned, of lessening these habits ? The 
advantage is two-fold : it involves the 

51 



PEG ALONG 

pleasure and comfort of others and it 
involves our own nervous control. 
With the pleasure and comfort of 
others this book has only the most 
indirect concern; it is not a treatise 
on ethics, but an effort to lessen the 
wear and tear which tend to ner- 
vous breakdown. With regard to the 
effect of this control upon ourselves, 
it is safe to say that if a person went 
no further in the matter than to con- 
quer the simple nervous habits I have 
mentioned, he would have acquired 
the power of lying absolutely still in 
bed at night in whatever position he 
assumed, and would find himself fall- 
ing asleep in a quarter of the accus- 
tomed time, or if he did not sleep, 
would find himself resting quietly, 
and storing up energy for the next 
day's work, instead of fussing and 
fuming away the little stock he had 
to draw on. Furthermore, he would 
find the day's work itself performed 
in a manner so much more restful that 

52 



WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 

the alteration would surprise him. 
And we have not even touched upon 
the more serious of the faulty habits 
that wear upon the nervous system. 
These involve the mind and the emo- 
tions. Such are insistence that things 
be done our way, impatience at delay, 
annoyance at trifles, foolish fears, fret 
over the ordinary annoyances of our 
employment or family life, chronic 
discontent with the cuisine, dwelling 
on the past, insistently forecasting 
the future, and a score of others, 
whose analysis is less important than 
the question what we are to do about 
them. 

Having once taken the enemy's out- 
posts, we may with confidence attack 
his main position. In other words, 
having gained control over the simple 
habits we may turn our attention to 
these more serious ones. The first 
step is to see our faults, to realize 
their undesirability, and to fix upon 
a definite ideal toward which to strive. 

53 



PEG ALONG 

When we take up such habits as 
fret, impatience, and living in the 
past, our score of failures for the day 
will be shorter at the outset, and it 
is likely to improve much more slowly 
than that of the simpler habits. Here 
the note-book will not suffice ; we shall 
have need for all our philosophy, and 
especially for its epitome, the maxim. 

When we can show a clean page 
for faults like these, it is not too much 
to say that we shall have given the 
go-by to nervous prostration and its 
ilk. We may get tired after hard 
work — this is legitimate and healthy ; 
from this we shall recover in a longer 
or shorter, generally shorter, time; 
but the agitated unrest of the ner- 
vously broken-down we shall never 
know. 

It is far from my purpose to advo- 
cate the attempt quite to change our 
nature. I should no more advise this 
than the plastic surgeon would coun- 
sel the change from pug to Roman 

54 



WHAT ANYONE CAN DO 

nose. I would not make the sour 
apple into a sweet apple, but reduce 
its objectionable acidity to "a pleas- 
ant tart." On this point Locke, in 
"Some Thoughts Concerning Educa- 
tion," says: "Everyone's natural 
genius should be carried as far as it 
could ; but to attempt the putting an- 
other upon him will be but labor in 
vain ; and what is so plastered on, will 
at best fit but untowardly, and have 
always hanging to it the ungraceful- 
ness of constraint and affectation." 

The first objection opposed to such 
suggestions as are offered in this 
chapter is that to follow them will 
take a person's whole time. On this 
point I can only say that we shall 
take no more time, and shall probably 
get further, by giving the experiment 
a trial, than by sitting down and 
arguing about it. Franklin succeeded 
in carrying out even his elaborate 
method, day after day, for a term of 
years during which he was not only 

55 



PEG ALONG 

obtaining a literary and scientific 
education rarely acquired in the regu- 
lar curriculum, but was supporting 
himself and aiding others, laying the 
foundation for a material fortune, 
and establishing for himself a place 
among leaders in literature, science 
and statesmanship. The man who 
accomplishes things seems always to 
be the one who has plenty of time. 

Surely some of us, though busy as 
bees in a bottle, are not accomplishing 
so much but that we might spare a 
thought, now and then, for a pencil- 
stroke that shall aid us in a matter 
not only bearing on our continued 
comfort and that of our friends, but is 
likely in the long run to prove a mate- 
rial asset, by prolonging our ability 
to carry on that very business from 
the pursuit of which we think we can 
not spare a "pig's wink." Let us 
"Stay a little, that we may make an 
end the sooner." 



56 



OVERINSISTENCE 

He persists as if his life lay on't. 

"All's Well that Ends Well." 

It is proverbial that the man sub- 
ject to minor ills shows more discon- 
tent than the possessor of a serious 
and incurable malady. This is doubt- 
less because of his insistent desire to 
be perfectly well. In other words, it 
is the case of the fly in the ointment : 

Life's little ills annoyed me when those little ills 
were few, 

And the one fly in the ointment put me in a dread- 
ful stew. 

But experience has taught me the infrequent good 
to prize, 

Now Fm glad to find some ointment in my little 
pot of flies. 

Hence a maxim I have found useful : 
Don't focus on the fly. 

Other people's vagaries are pecu- 
liarly ridiculous. I remember one 
day approaching a hotel in front of 
which was a coupe. I was startled by 

57 



PEG ALONG 

hearing a high-pitched voice, which 
proceeded from the carriage, exclaim- 
ing, "Don't touch it I Don't touch 
it!" I hastened my steps anticipat- 
ing trouble, but was relieved to hear 
the voice continue, "I want to open 
it myself." It turned out to be only 
a certain old gentleman who insists 
that no one else shall open the door 
before he alights. My first impulse 
was to say "absurd"; my second was 
to blush upon recalling similar in- 
sistences of my own, namely that the 
waiter allow me to pour my own 
coffee, light my own cigar, and pre- 
pare my own grapefruit. 

I have known a traveler to go out 
of his way to avoid a certain hostelry, 
because dinner was there served at 
noon and supper at night. The whole 
of Europe had become involved, 
meantime, in the conflict that has re- 
duced vast numbers of the well-to-do 
to a situation in which meal time is 
a negligible consideration in compari- 

58 



OVERINSISTENCE 

son with the question whether the 
meal occur at all, or, if it does, 
whether they will be there to eat it. 
In this connection I am often asked 
what is the use of conforming to es- 
tablished custom so long as you can 
have custom modified in your favor — 
in other words, why not have things as 
you want them when you can, and 
postpone conforming until some time 
when there is no other alternative? 
This opens up the whole question of 
the value of mental training. There 
are two bearings of such training, one 
upon others, the other upon ourselves. 
With regard to its effect on others, 
the more we learn to accommodate 
ourselves without friction the more 
comfortable companions we become, 
and the more easy we are to get along 
with. This reason for learning to 
conform is not likely to appeal to 
those who asK the question. With re- 
gard to the effect on tKe individual, 
such training puts him, eventually, in 

59 



PEG ALONG 

the way of far greater enjoyment than 
is afforded even by the pleasure of 
having his own way to-day. More- 
over, no item is more important than 
serenity of mind in preparation for 
restful nights, comfortable old age, 
and immunity from nervous break- 
down. Such serenity of mind is not 
compatible with overinsistence — un- 
less, indeed, the gratification of that 
insistence is continuous and complete, 
a state of affairs hardly expected on 
this planet, even by the most exigent. 

Nor are the advantages of mind- 
management purely passive. The re- 
sult of habitual self-control is shown 
in times of stress, both in the prompt 
judgment and executive qualities of 
those who take command, and in the 
ready compliance of those whose place 
it is to obey. I know of no better 
illustration than the conduct of some 
two hundred and fifty inmates of a 
certain college building destroyed not 
long ago by fire. AH were mustered 

60 



OVERINSISTENCE 

in the hall without excitement or 
mishap, and none disobeyed the orders 
of the captains that there be no return 
to the rooms for articles left behind. 

Epictetus went so far with his 
training-out of insistence, that no 
position in which he was placed could 
cloud his happiness. Even in confine- 
ment he was happy. The following 
quotation from Higginson's Epictetus 
not only shows the extent to which 
this philosopher carried his theory 
of accommodation to circumstances, 
hence serenity, but it shows that this 
theory was not merely one of laissez 
faire. Moral courage also played a 
part in his philosophy: "I must die, 
but must I die groaning, too ? I must 
be fettered, must I be lamenting, too ? 
I must be exiled; and what hinders 
me then but that I may go smiling and 
cheerful and serene?' ' Betray a se- 
cret?' 'I will not betray it, for this 
is in my power. " " Then I will fetter 
you." "What did you say, man? 

61 



PEG ALONG 

Fetter me? You will fetter my leg, 
but not Zeus himself can get the bet- 
ter of my free will. ? ? 

A word regarding the mechanism of 
insistence- I suppose that every move- 
ment we make, excepting such an 
automatic one as walking, is preceded 
by a mental picture. The definite- 
ness of this picture must vary in dif- 
ferent individuals, and the desire of 
making the act conform to the pict- 
ure must also vary. This variation 
is doubtless the essential difference 
between the "easy going " man and 
the man ' ' set in his ways. ' ' In the lat- 
ter the picture is so vivid, his insis- 
tence on completing it so great, that 
the hiatus caused by leaving it uncom- 
pleted almost amounts to mental pain. 
The situation is the same regarding 
the whole future of this individual; 
what he plans must be performed re- 
gardless of the comfort of others, and 
sometimes of his own advantage. 

It is a similar attitude that pro- 

62 



OVERINSISTENCE 

duces the fixed aversions, the diffi- 
culty of reconciling one's self to 
slights, criticisms, or even to certain 
smells or sounds, in other words, the 
obsession, which I have elsewhere de- 
fined as "An unduly insistent and 
compulsive thought, habit of mind, or 
tendency to action." I have learned 
of a lady, otherwise sensible, and in 
no way incapacitated, who has so 
great an aversion to a peach tree, that 
if the possessor of such a tree visits 
her, the chair and the family have to 
be disinfected and the doorknobs 
washed. Another lady not only can- 
not go through a street that has had 
tar upon it, but has gone so far as to 
burn the furniture used by the visi- 
tor who has passed through such a 
street. It is difficult to find the source 
of these particular aversions, but as 
a rule the development of such obses- 
sions can be traced to some experience 
whose effect on the emotions becomes 
intensified as time goes on. 

63 



PEG ALONG 

Simple and harmless habits some- 
times drift into obsessions by mere 
continuance and by the empty feeling 
produced by their omission. Suppose 
one acquires the idle habit of twist- 
ing the loose nut on top of every hy- 
drant he passes. If he is unable to 
discontinue this habit when his atten- 
tion is called to it, the habit has become 
an obsession. In other words, the di- 
viding line between the habit and the 
obsession comes at the point where we 
feel insistent need. The line had been 
passed in the case of the gentleman of 
whom I have heard who touched a cer- 
tain tree on his way to the office. Fail- 
ing to touch it one morning, he took a 
cab and returned to carry out the duty. 

Excessive and prolonged grief 
sometimes results from the morbid in- 
sistence that, whatever happens to 
others, the lives of our friends shall 
conform to our expectations. When 
the Countess of Essex, after the death 
of a child, allowed her despair to in- 

64 



OVERINSISTENCE 

crease instead of diminish, and when 
it had become a matter of general 
comment that she was neglecting, on 
this account, her other private and 
public duties, Sir William Temple 
ventured to remonstrate in a letter, 
which has taken its place among the 
classic essays of the English language. 
In the course of the letter he says: 
"A friend makes me a feast, and sets 
before me all that his care or kind- 
ness could provide ; but I set my heart 
upon one dish alone, and if that hap- 
pen to be thrown down, I scorn all the 
rest ; and although he send for another 
of the same, yet I rise from the table 
in a rage, and say my friend is my 
enemy, and has done me the greatest 
wrong in the world; have I reason, 
Madam, or good grace in what I do ?" 
Not that I should favor a corre- 
spondence so expressed to-day. Such 
encroachments upon the prerogative 
of the recipient would be likely to in- 
crease rather than lessen the morbid 

5 65 



PEG ALONG 

attitude. Intolerance for suggestion 
is common among mental sufferers of 
this type. On investigating the case 
of a certain nervous invalid not long 
ago, I came to the conclusion that her 
sufferings resulted from her own in- 
tolerance for every unusual sensation. 
This view was confirmed by the fact 
that when I took the knee-jerk, she 
jumped as if it caused her extreme 
pain. I assured her that this was an 
everyday affair of which the average 
person takes no notice, and asked her 
to try to restrain the jump when I 
made the test upon the other knee. 
This suggestion produced a violent 
emotional outbreak and the statement 
that if I had not told her to restrain 
it she would have done so of her own 
accord, but now she couldn't — and she 
didn't. Then followed recriminations 
because I thought she did not try, 
the emphatic statement that neither 
I nor anyone else could know how 
hard she tried, and the like, her loss 

66 



OVERINSISTENCE 

of self-control increasing with argu- 
ment. This attitude was increased by 
my efforts to stem the tide by pointing 
out that my opinion should be only a 
side issue, especially since she would 
probably never see me again. This 
statement I could make, by the way, 
with a clear conscience, for patients of 
this type rarely consult again the phy- 
sician who does not "understand," in 
other words "coddle," them. 

I have made up my mind that there 
is a class of so-called nervous invalids 
who really do not want to get well. 
Theoretically they crave mental and 
physical perfection, indeed they often 
protest they would gladly make any 
sacrifice in the world to attain it. But 
when it comes to the "show-down" 
they are unwilling, though perfectly 
able, to make the effort required for 
meeting the everyday responsibilities 
■and performing the duties expected 
of the person in ordinary health. In- 
valids of this type make slaves of all 

67 



PEG ALONG 

who are willing to cater to their fancy. 
Once the physician satisfies himself 
that a chronic invalid falls in this 
class, he may as well recognize the fu- 
tility of all effort directed toward 
arousing her ambition. Physicians 
attempting to minister to mental needs 
of such patients will appreciate the 
feelings of the teacher the dream of 
whose life was to become a waitress in 
a first-class restaurant, for there she 
would have at least the fun of pass- 
ing people something they wanted! 
That the overinsistent parent may 
become tiresome even to the objects 
of his, or her, solicitude was shown 
by an experience recently told me by 
a colleague who w r as attempting to 
modify the training of an only child. 
The mother, it seemed, could never 
leave the child at school, but must be 
herself on hand in case the teacher 
needed assistance. The physician was 
carefully explaining to the father the 
error of this attitude on the part of 

68 



OVERINSISTENCE 

the mother, and urging that the latter 
stay at home and take care of him, 
upon which the father observed, 
"What have you got against me?" 

Even the conjugal insistence that 
shudders at separation for a day, may 
itself become a factor in a longer sepa- 
ration based on incompatibility of 
temper. It is no disparagement of 
wives to add : A little absence, now and 
then, is relished by the best of men. 

To recur to the matter of excessive 
grief — I have been urged to join a 
propaganda against wearing mourn- 
ing. But this opens up quite another 
question. If, indeed, it could be estab- 
lished that this custom tended to fos- 
ter such morbid prolongation of de- 
pression as that for which Sir 
William brought his friend to task, 
and if there were no compensating 
advantages, a reform might well be 
worth considering. I am by no means 
sure that this is the case. In fact, 
I can conjure up so many arguments, 



PEG ALONG 

pro and con, regarding the effect upon 
the mind, that this feature of the case 
seems to me quite negligible. If, 
again, it were a burdensome expense 
imposed upon those unable and un- 
willing to assume it, a questionable 
phase would be introduced. The case 
would be quite different, again, if the 
general custom conformed to that ob- 
taining not long since and, so far as 
I know, to-day, on a small island off 
the Canadian coast, settled by the 
French long ago. When a death 
occurs in the family, each female 
member and the males, <so far as they 
can, must dress in deepest mourning 
for at least a year, some going so far 
as to wear it forever. Even little chil- 
dren must be swathed in black, with 
black crepe veils. For one to show a 
bright and shining face is to place 
himself without the pale. No musical 
instrument is touched for a year. 
You are supposed to be "in mourn- 
ing," with no hope of escape. 

70 



OVERINSISTENCE 

There is nothing comparable to this 
in New England, where, so far as I 
know, the demands of society are not 
so exigent that one is even looked 
upon askance if he fail to follow the 
custom of adopting mourning. This 
being the case, I should be inclined 
to let well enough alone, and allow 
each individual and each family to 
exercise unmolested choice. In any 
event, I should want to be very 
sure of my ground before taking up 
cudgels against long-established cus- 
tom. The one who does so soon real- 
izes the significance of the saying, 
" Nothing is so solid as froth. " Judge 
Luke Poland, old-time congressman 
from Vermont, used to say, "You'll 
find, Squire, in the long run, that every- 
body knows more than anybody does. ' ' 

In the matter of wardrobe, by the 
way, I am told that Judge Poland 
himself clung to the swallowtail and 
knee breeches long after they were 
in the general discard, showing that 

71 



PEG ALONG 

in this respect, he was not entirely 
guided by the voice of the majority. 
But for him to err in this direction 
showed no disregard for the pleasure 
of others, as do those who follow Ste- 
venson in his arraignment of the sarto- 
rial and allied demands of Society. 

"One is delicate in eating, " he says, 
"another in wine, a third in furniture 
or works of art or dress ; and I, who 
care nothing for any of these refine- 
ments, who am perhaps a plain ath- 
letic creature and love exercise, beef, 
beer, flannel-shirts, and a camp bed, 
am yet called upon to assimilate all 
these other tastes and make these for- 
eign occasions of expenditure my 
own. It may be cynical; I am sure 
I will be told it is selfish; but I will 
spend my money as I please and for 
my own intimate personal gratifica- 
tion, and should count myself a nin- 
compoop indeed to lay out the color 
of a halfpenny on any fancied social 
decency or duty. I shall not wear 

72 



OVERINSISTENCE 

gloves unless my hands are cold, or 
unless I am born with a delight in 
them. Dress is my own affair, and 
that of one other in the world. " 

To which one answer is, that in fol- 
lowing many of these conventions we 
only do our share toward the pre- 
sentability and the pleasure of the 
society of which we form a part. It is 
to be hoped we don fine raiment for 
the opera not simply to gratify our 
vanity, but that we, as units, may not 
mar the scheme of decoration which is 
a desirable feature of the occasion. 

There is something suggestive in 
the very elaborateness of explanation 
on the part of the dissenter from 
established custom. As regards the 
amenities, at least, no apology is 
needed for following the beaten track. 
For myself, I feel rather sorry than 
proud every time I fracture this 
variety of convention. At all events, 
I hardly see my way to join in a cru- 
sade against the custom of wearing 

73 



PEG ALONG 

mourning, a custom already becom- 
ing, in the natural course of events, 
sufficiently elastic to be onerous to no 
one unless lie make it so. Indeed, I 
am inclined to think that the very 
insistence to see society suddenly 
freed from this so-called shackle par- 
takes of the obsession, and that the 
crusaders so obsessed should be re- 
minded that 

No wild enthusiast ever yet could rest 

Till half mankind were like himself possessed. 

If I should ever come to number this 
among my pet aversions, I hope I 
may by that time have cultivated 
enough complaisance to shoulder the 
aversion along with my other burdens, 
light and heavy, necessary and un- 
necessary, and "peg along. " 

Some obsessions are directly trace- 
able to timidity. To shun the inside 
seat at the theatre generally means, 
in its incipiency, a fear of fire or 
fainting, but if indulged, the tendency 
becomes coercive without conscious 

74 



OVERINSISTENCE 

fear. The same is true of the dislike 
for elevators, tunnels and escalators. 
I know a person who has never yet 
used the telephone; he is unable to 
explain his aversion to doing so, but 
always manages, by one subterfuge 
or another, to avoid it. I fancy the 
origin of the trouble was a fear that 
he would become confused. Such ob- 
sessions justify the poet's plaint: 

How sad whene'er I have desire 
To get from here to thence 
To find directly in the way 
A barbed wire fence. 

The habit of dealing in a small way 
with money matters may drift into 
an obsession. There are plenty of 
men who spend money freely on the 
stable, but who would not dream of 
spending half a dollar for a cab. To 
use a more modern instance, a single 
"taxi" fare will wring a groan from 
the man who buys new tires for his 
limousine without a murmur. I have 
known a man of large affairs to insist 

75 



PEG ALONG 

that the waiter go back to the desk 
to correct a mistake of three cents on 
a sizable bill, with the remark, "We 
business men have to be very par- 
ticular/ J Indeed, I have known a 
wealthy man to quibble over a single 
cent in a much larger transaction. 
There are many who never think of 
buying paper for ordinary purposes, 
making use of the inside of envelopes, 
the backs of old letters, pamphlets, 
and the like, the wasting of which 
seems to them little short of crimi- 
nal. A well-to-do lady of this type en- 
tered a store one day and stated that 
she never bought pins before, but 
always picked up old ones ; there had 
been a funeral next door, however, 
and they had borrowed every one she 
had in the house. She would like, 
therefore, to buy a strip off a paper 
of pins. Some apparently do their 
telephoning at the expense of the 
bank. A certain depositor tells me 
that on looking for a chance at the 

76 



OVERINSISTENCE 

wire the other day, she found she had 
to wait for another lady to call up, by 
actual count, a dozen stores. At one 
time I had occasion to use a certain 
suburban train as a " commuter. ? ' It 
was the custom on that route, if a 
passenger left his ticket at home, to 
tender a dime — a fraction of a *cent 
more than the cost of the fare — and 
ride on the ticket of his neighbor. One 
day I made this proposition to a fellow 
passenger, who surprised me by de- 
murring, saying that the transaction 
would disarrange his bookkeeping ! 

It is fortunate for both publishers 
and authors that the obsession never 
to buy a book, though common, is not 
universal. A successful business man 
once told me that he was extremely 
anxious to read a certain novel. He 
had made every effort to do so for 
over a year, he said, but every time 
he asked for it at the Public Library 
it was out, and none of his friends 
happened to have a copy ! 

77 



PEG ALONG 

Of the obsession for eight hours' 
sleep I have spoken elsewhere, but the 
subject will perhaps bear a little fur- 
ther elaboration. The worrier on 
this point doubtless has in mind, as a 
basis for his fears, certain cases of 
prolonged insomnia with serious men- 
tal symptoms, perhaps with unfavor- 
able termination. But in such cases 
the seriousness lies not so much in 
the loss of sleep as in the disorder 
causing it, for example, alcoholism or 
mania. The fact that, in such cases, 
sleep improves with convalescence 
leads to the conclusion that insomnia 
itself was at the root of the trouble. 
Similarly, we sometimes read of a per- 
son dying of hiccoughs, a statement 
that might well frighten the timorous 
victim of that harmless habit, until he 
learns that death was not due to the 
hiccough, but to the disease of which 
the hiccough was only a symptom. 

By way of a reminder that good 
work can be accomplished with less 

78 



OVERINSISTENCE 

than eight hours' sleep, Franklin's 
daily schedule only allowed seven 
hours, and out of that seven he must 
have taken at least some moments to 
hop into bed and out again. Sir Ed- 
ward Coke allowed even less, thus : 

Sex horas somn.o totidemque legibus aequis — 

And further, Gibbon said of Justin- 
ian: "The measure of his sleep was 
not less rigorous ; after the repose of 
a single hour the body was awakened 
by the soul, and, to the astonishment 
of his chamberlains, Justinian walked 
or studied till the morning light. 
Such restless application prolonged 
his time for the acquisition of knowl- 
edge and the despatch of business/' 

In citing these cases I do not wish 
to be interpreted as denying the de- 
sirability of a good night's sleep. I 
cite them simply to show the possibil- 
ity of getting on with much less than 
is generally thought essential. Such 
instances, exceptional though they 

79 



PEG ALONG 

may be, certainly show us that we 
need give ourselves no uneasiness if 
we have missed a few of the desired 
hours. It is to be hoped that the 
memory of these cases will foster the 
philosophic attitude which in itself 
favors sleep, and will tend to lessen 
our worry about not sleeping, a worry 
which in itself keeps us awake. 

Some men after losing half an 
hour's sleep feel uncomfortable all 
day. Others feel "logy" if they have 
slept an hour too much. In other 
words, our preconceived ideas greatly 
influence our feelings. I have no 
doubt that if a man should think, 
with Samson, "If I be shaven, then 
my strength will go from me, and I 
shall become weak," he would col- 
lapse after each visit to the barber. 
However this may be, for us to focus, 
after these considerations, on our ex- 
act hours of sleep, is to cultivate the 
kind of vision Pope had in mind in 
asking : 

80 



OVERINSISTENCE 

"Why has not man a microscopic eye? 
For the plain reason man is not a fly. 

Life is too serious to be taken too 
seriously, even though we may not 
quite follow John Gay, who, in a 
moment of depression, wrote the verse 
that, by his own request, decorates his 
tombstone in Westminster Abbey: 

Life is a jest and all things show it; 
I thought so once and now I know it. 

In the attempt to suppress overin- 
sistence it will help us greatly if we 
can learn to turn our thoughts reso- 
lutely in another direction. In doing 
this we must, of course, bear in mind 
the danger that we may make an 
obsession of the new subject. A cer- 
tain intensely religious lady went to 
church several times daily, to the 
neglect of her household duties. On 
being taken to a baseball game for 
diversion, she transferred her affec- 
tions from the church to the diamond, 
and finally deemed her time wasted 
when the league was not doing busi- 

6 81 



PEG ALONG 

ness. She learned to call the players 
by their first names, and now knows 
the batting average of every member 
of the major league. 

It is a Poor Pish that cannot jump 
from the Prying-pan into the Pire. 

The question may be raised whether 
firmness of purpose is not a virtue 
rather than a faulty mental habit, to 
which the answer is in the affirmative. 
This only shows, however, that like 
many another fault, insistence has a 
virtue at its core. Surely no habit of 
mind is more praiseworthy than that 
of following with grim determination 
the path to success, whether material 
or moral, nor should a principle be 
sacrificed for the sake of avoiding 
friction. Such determination our 
New England forefathers possessed 
in high degree and they were, per- 
haps, not always comfortable play- 
mates (if they ever played) on ac- 
count of inability to drop the habit 
when it was not called for. But when 

82 



OVERINSISTENCE 

their progeny exercise the inherited 
trait on such questions as who shall 
open the door of the carriage or who 
shall sugar the coffee, one is reminded 
of the remark of Caius Marius, re- 
garding an illustrious ancestry: 
"When a descendant is dwarfed in 
comparison, it should be considered 
a shame rather than a boast. " In 
this case the effective weapon of the 
parent has become in the hands of the 
child only a discomfort to his neigh- 
bors and a menace to himself. 

In advising the modification of in- 
sistence, I always make a reservation 
in favor of one or two desirable obses- 
sions, desirable mainly because they 
affect others as well as ourselves. 
Such are paying our bills, keeping 
our appointments, and reaching the 
railway station before the train starts. 
To take up the last one first, when 
my friend laughs at me for wishing 
to be in the station five minutes be- 
fore train time, I tell him his habit 

83 



PEG ALONG 

seems to me quite as unreasonable 
and fully as obsessive, namely, that of 
insisting on " killing " the additional 
five minutes at home, doing nothing 
in particular, simply for the privilege 
of rushing across the station after the 
departing train, if, indeed, he does 
not miss it altogether and disappoint 
someone who must meet him at the 
other end. 

With regard to paying bills, I have 
nothing in common with the one 
who counsels "Let the other fellow 
worry. " Even as regards the debtor, 
while I agree that the prompt pay- 
ment of bills entails a loss of interest, 
nevertheless I am sure that, even leav- 
ing the Golden Eule out of the ques- 
tion, prompt payment of bills, in the 
long run, will prove for the payer not 
only a comfortable failing, but a 
business asset. 

About keeping appointments, al- 
though I can appreciate the feelings 
of the man who, after waiting a half- 

84 



OVERINSISTENCE 

hour for Ms friend, complained, 
"Punctuality is the thief of time," 
yet I favor, in this instance, letting 
the New England Conscience have its 
way. Sometimes the other fellow is 
himself on time, but even if he is late, 
now is the chance for us to practise 
patience, and refrain from overin- 
sistence that others be as particular 
as ourselves. 

Again, there are certain profes- 
sions and lines of business in which 
no amount of attention to detail can 
be out of place. Under the former 
head falls the modern surgical opera- 
tion, under the latter, the labors of 
the publisher. Robert Sterling Yard 
says, "Publishers are often accused 
of being fussers. Why should they 
not be fussers % Think of how many 
individual books they have to fuss 
about!" He might have added, How 
many details in those books must be 
carried in mind, each of which has a 
bearing on the success of the enter- 

85 



PEG ALONG 

prise, the neglect of some of which, 
indeed, would make the book, the 
author, and the publisher alike, the 
laughing stock of the reading com- 
munity. Then there is the druggist. 
It would hardly be safe to counsel him 
to conduct his business in a free and 
easy way, and not bother to remember 
where he put the poison bottle ! 

Such exceptions only serve to em- 
phasize, by comparison, the futility 
of the eternal fussing over trifles to 
which many of us are prone. In most 
affairs the successful man is the one 
who has the happy faculty of deciding 
right three out of every five ques- 
tions, and of not letting the other two 
keep him awake even if he has decided 
them wrong. The insistence that all 
questions must be decided right, only 
defeats, as a rule, its own end. For 
the persistent fusser over trifles I 
recommend the inelegant but forceful 
maxim : 

This rag is not worth chewing. 
86 



VI 

APPROBATIVENESS 

I pity bashful men, who feel the pain 
Of fancied scorn and undeserved disdain, 
And bear the marks upon a blushing face 
Of needless shame, and self-imposed disgrace. 

Cowper 

Among the occasional letters writ- 
ten me by those who read to criticize 
rather than apply, I have recently 
received one from a lady who tells 
me I am wrong in attributing dread 
of society to exaggerated self-con- 
sciousness. She has the symptom, 
and is not self-conscious at all; this 
she knows, because she has studied 
herself carefully ! 

I fear the study was made from so 
near a viewpoint that the rest of the 
world was quite out of focus. The 
following remark of Samuel Johnson 
(in the Rambler) may here serve a 
good turn: "But the truth is that no 
man is much regarded by the rest of 

87 



PEG ALONG 

the world. He that considers how lit- 
tle he dwells upon the condition of 
others will learn how little the atten- 
tion of others is attracted by himself. 
"While we see multitudes passing be- 
fore us of whom, perhaps, not one 
appears to deserve our notice or ex- 
cite our sympathy, we should remem- 
ber that we, likewise, are lost in the 
same throng ; that the eye which hap- 
pens to glance upon us is turned in a 
moment on him that follows us, and 
that the utmost which we can reason- 
ably hope or fear is to fill a vacant 
hour with prattle, and be forgotten. " 
To say nothing of ourselves, it is 
probable that of those who hold the 
centre of the stage to-day the major- 
ity will in time meet the finish of the 
noble Roman, whose statue the mod- 
ern poet apostrophizes : 

Famous once among thy fellows, 
Honored thus in ageless stone, 

Destined for august remembrance — 

Write thine epitaph " Unknown." 

88 



APPROBATIVENESS 

Indeed, we may count ourselves for- 
tunate if we do not discover that in 
some quarters at least, our status does 
not even attain the high level of in- 
difference, as in the case of the un- 
popular clubman: 

"T have been grossly insulted, " he 
said to a fellow-member. 

"How so?" inquired his friend. 

"Mr. Blank offered me $100 to 
resign." 

"Don't take it," was the response, 
"you can do better." 

Not a few trades have flourished in 
times past, and some, perhaps, still 
flourish, on the knowledge of the 
operators that the average man is 
never tired of hearing about himself. 
Under this head I would include 
astrology, phrenology, palmistry, and 
the various methods of fortune tell- 
ing. Phrenology, I fancy, is little 
practised now, but in my youth the 
visit of the phrenologist was of regu- 
lar recurrence. I remember that the 

89 



PEG ALONG 

pleasure of a shampoo, a ball game, 
or even a five-cent ice cream paled 
into nothingness compared with the 
sense of well-being that pervaded my 
whole system when the professor (I 
think for fifty cents) expounded my 
virtues, duly balanced by my faults. 
I was benevolent, but not to the point 
of prodigality; my bump of comba- 
tiveness showed that I was aggressive, 
but this tendency was duly modified 
by my bump of caution ; I was care- 
ful of my money, but not parsimo- 
nious, since my bump of benevolence 
kept me from being " close, " and so 
on through the list. 

He did not tell me what counter- 
acted the influence of my bump of 
approbativeness. In point of fact, I 
fear that the counteracting bump of 
commonsense, if such a thing is recog- 
nized in the science, was sadly want- 
ing in my case. And it was on this 
absence that the professor banked. 
The same desire for approbation that 

90 



APPROBATIVENESS 

made me swell with pride under his 
manipulation made me shrink into in- 
significance when some childish game 
placed me in the centre of a ring from 
which there was no escape until I had 
guessed the answer to twenty ques- 
tions. 

In this desire for universal ap- 
proval, young people are apt to lose 
their perspective regarding the im- 
portance of other people's opinion. I 
think it was Henry Esmond who sud- 
denly came to realize that he was 
often taking a hansom merely to make 
an impression on the driver of that 
vehicle. When the waiter in the res- 
taurant assumes that the diner will 
order an expensive dish, he is figuring 
on the approbativeness of the patron, 
and the younger the patron, the more 
likely he is to fall in with the sugges- 
tion. 

The self-conscious child should 
learn that if he can acquire the art 
of bearing with equanimity not only 

91 



PEG ALONG 

criticism and ridicule, but unde- 
served blame and even insult, his re- 
ward will be a general approbation 
far excelling that attained by excel- 
lence in any branch of learning or 
athletics. It seems paradoxical to 
state that one can gain respect and 
affection while "making a fool of 
himself. ' ' But the world is not heart- 
broken if we do make fools of our- 
selves. On the contrary, nine out of 
ten are rather pleased to advance 
themselves a peg by lowering us. A 
celebrated writer and excellent judge 
of human nature has said, "For God's 
sake give me the young man who has 
brains enough to make a fool of him- 
self !" The following quotation from 
the same writer shows that he thor- 
oughly appreciated the difficulties of 
the youthful mind : 

"A young man feels himself one 
too many in the world ; his is a painful 
situation; he has no calling; no ob- 
vious utility; no ties but to his 

92 ' 



APPHOBATIVENESS 

parents, and these he is sure to dis- 
regard. I do not think that a proper 
allowance has been made for this true 
cause of suffering in youth; but by 
the mere fact of a prolonged exist- 
ence, we outgrow either the fact or 
else the feeling. Either we become 
so callously accustomed to our own 
useless feeling in the world, or else — 
and this, thank God, in the majority 
of cases — we so collect about us the 
interest or the love of our fellows, so 
multiply our effective part in the 
affairs of life, that we need to enter- 
tain no longer the question of our 
right to be." 

Regarding the question of popular- 
ity or unpopularity, the most unpopu- 
lar man I know is the man who never 
makes a fool of himself, and who 
never makes a mistake — at least he 
never acknowledges that he does. One 
of the most popular, on the other 
hand, shows what ignorance he has 
at every turn, and rather avoids than 



PEG ALONG 

courts the opportunity to take prece- 
dence whether in learning or in skill. 

We all desire to stand high in the 
estimation of others. Commonsense 
gradually teaches us properly to bal- 
ance this desire with the commonplace 
realities of life. We may even finally 
go too far, like the man who said it 
was not worth while to dress for 
strangers, because they would never 
see him again, nor was it worth while 
to do so for. his friends, because they 
saw him every day. But even this 
attitude is more restful than that of 
the overconscientious youth who suf- 
fers from " ingrowing sensitiveness." 

The following will serve as an 
everyday illustration of the tribula- 
tions of oversensitive and introspec- 
tive youth. The case was that of a 
young woman presented at a staff 
meeting of the Psychopathic Hospi- 
tal. She was in the depths of despair 
over her own shortcomings. As an 
example of these shortcomings, I re- 

94 



APPROBATIVENESS 

member her description of her feel- 
ings at the Salem fire. It seemed that 
the depression which the situation de- 
manded was modified in her case by a 
pertain exaltation on viewing the 
extensive ruins. In other words, on 
analyzing her sensations she was hor- 
rified to detect an element of pleasure 
in the presence of the holocaust. She 
was asked if she did not realize that 
everyone possessed this conflicting set 
of emotions, and that the average nor- 
mal individual, if he stops to think of 
it, will find that while watching a fire, 
however sorry he may be for the suf- 
ferers, he has also a sneaking desire 
to see the flames mount to the heavens. 
It was furthermore suggested to her 
that in watching a football game, the 
most tender-hearted will recognize the 
fact, strive as he may against it, that 
he possesses an undercurrent of the 
old Roman delight in seeing blood 
flow upon the arena. These sugges- 
tions she evidently thought were 

95 



PEG ALONG 

merely offered for her consolation, 
and contained no element of truth. 
She had so long kept her feelings and 
thoughts to herself that she had come 
to think her mental processes alto- 
gether abnormal and peculiar. Ap- 
parently regretting that she had dis- 
closed them as far as she had, she 
proceeded to deny that she had ever 
before experienced the faintest sus- 
picion of such a conflict of emotions, 
and appeared determined, from that 
point on, for the sake of making a 
better impression on the Staff, to con- 
ceal the truth about herself. 

This case illustrates the mingling of 
approbativeness with the other troub- 
lous imaginings of youth. Such men- 
tal conflicts form no small part of the 
discomfort common, in early life, to 
the self-centred. As we grow older, 
we gradually learn that others share 
in what we thought our own peculiar 
foibles. This leads us in turn more 
freely to acknowledge them. Along 

96 



APPROBATIVENESS 

with this comes a comparative indif- 
ference to the opinion of others, ex- 
cept in matters of importance. In 
other words, our desire to attain uni- 
versal approbation lessens with ad- 
vancing years. 

The most important lesson to be 
drawn from this study, and the prac- 
tical point to be emphasized, is that 
one can use his approbativeness for 
a lever to pry himself into a position 
of emotional equilibrium. What I 
mean is this. Suppose I am gifted 
with a morbid degree of self -study, 
and am by nature unduly anxious 
to make a favorable impression on 
everything and everybody in sight. 
To the realization of this dream I may 
devote my life in vain. But suppose 
I come to realize that the philosophi- 
cal attitude will gain for me general 
approbation though my mental equip- 
ment may be mediocre, and that any 
gain I make in the effort to attain this 
attitude is a step in the direction of 

7 97 



PEG ALONG 

the goal I covet. If I learn to keep 
my temper under every provocation, 
to control impatience, and modify in- 
sistence, to smile when criticized or 
insulted, and to join a laugh at my 
own expense, I may finally gain the 
respect even of the man who knew me 
when I was a boy, and that is "some" 
respect. 



VII 

FRET 
Cas. I did not think you could have been so angry. 
Bru. 0, Cassius, I am sick of many griefs. 
Cas. Of your philosophy you make no use, 
If you give place to accidental evils. 

Julius Ccesar 

A friend of mine lias a high- 
spirited youngster for whose benefit 
he often repeats the admonition : 

Dogs delight to bark and bite, 
It is their nature to. 

It has occurred to me on seeing him 
fume over a trifling delay to wonder 
whether he would acknowledge the 
com if the youngster should some day 
cap his father's verse as follows: 

Champ not thy bit, nor paw the ground, 
That's what the horses do. 

From which foolish rhyme I have 
evolved, for my own use, the com- 
mandment : Champ not thy hit. How- 
ever decorative champing the bit and 
pawing the ground may be in the 
horse, when we do it ourselves the 
custom is neither aesthetic nor restful. 



PEG ALONG 

Nor does it get us anywhere. There 
is a great deal of talk about efficiency 
nowadays, but did it ever occur to you 
to wonder how many calories and how 
many foot-pounds we waste every 
time we become "hot under the col- 
lar." And it is all really wasted, for 
no iota of accomplishment was ever 
attributable to the state of mind of 
which Butler says: 

And that which does them greatest harm, 
Their spiritual gizzards are too warm. 

If we could only get a bird's eye view 
of ourselves and thereby come to real- 
ize how trivial are the sources of our 
fret compared with the advantages we 
gain from those who fret us! This 
is particularly true in the home circle, 
in which the familiarity that dulls 
our appreciation of benefits only in- 
creases our intolerance for faults. 
The husband forgets that his better 
half has brought up his children, 
managed his household, mended his 
socks and nursed him through his ill- 
100 



FRET 

ness, but becomes more and more im- 
patient because she will use per- 
fumery. Meantime she passes over 
the fact that he rescued her from pov- 
erty, from a family that irked her, or 
some worse fate, gives her a box at the 
opera and hooks her up behind. She 
only knows his table manners are exe- 
crable and that he doesn't try to mend 
them. Indeed, I believe the case is on 
record in which she wanted a divorce 
because his hair didn't match the fur- 
niture, &nd he declined to dye it ! 

If we really wanted to live com- 
fortably instead of keeping ourselves 
and our environment constantly on 
edge, the most confirmed fretter 
among us could in time attain the atti- 
tude of the cheerful invalid who 
assured his nurse he liked the crumbs, 
for they kept him from skidding in 
the bed ! 

It is only the exceptional fretter 
that recognizes his own attitude, and 
even he can hardly stop fretting long 
101 



PEG ALONG 

enough to listen to a suggestion, to 
say nothing of adopting it. The other 
day I was telling a patient some of 
the maxims I found useful in curbing 
impatience, and was advising him to 
assimilate them. After hearing me 
gravely through, he said I did not 
understand his case, he wasn't in the 
least impatient. In the course of the 
consultation he had occasion to use the 
telephone, and no sooner had he given 
the number than he was rapidly pump- 
ing the arm of the instrument up and 
down, impatiently demanding to know 
why the operator couldn't get the 
number at once ! The mental healer 
who should attempt to reconcile this 
man to the bedful of crumbs, I fear 
would have his hands full. 

He's truly valiant that can wisely suffer 

The worst that men can breathe, and make his 
wrongs 

His outsides, to wear them like his raiment, care- 
lessly, 

And ne'er prefer his injuries to his heart, 

To bring it into danger. 

102 



FRET 

Prominent among the innumerable 
things that fret me is the habit people 
have of tearing paper to bits and scat- 
tering it to the winds. I once went 
so far as to remonstrate with a man 
who was thus decorating the Public 
Garden with his correspondence. It 
happened in the autumn. "Why 
don't you focus on the falling leaves/' 
he retorted, "and find fault because 
the Lord makes such a muss?" His 
argument did not quite go on all 
fours, but it served to remind me that 
my attitude also partook of the obses- 
sion, and that I, too, was making a 
nuisance of myself. Since that time, 
whenever I catch sight of an offend- 
ing scrap, I say to myself, "Peg 
along, Fussy!" And sometimes it 
works. This would be a useful motto 
for some reader who thinks he doesn't 
need it. By its use I have brought 
myself to a state of mind in which I 
can even sometimes see without a 

103 



PEG ALONG 

shudder an entire Sunday edition 
launched from an electric by one of 
those passengers who use the scenery 
for a waste-basket. 

I have been asked by an argumen- 
tative person of the insistent type how 
the world can be built up by such a 
lowering of the ideals and by such 
acceptance of the improper. My only 
answer is that if I succeed in manag- 
ing myself I am doing more toward 
world-building than by any amount 
of fussing about the inevitable. 

The origin of our fret is sometimes 
really worthy, but we overdo it. 
There are people who almost go into 
a convulsion if they see a pin upon 
the floor. They can talk by the hour 
about the damage to the community 
of such articles out of place. At the 
bottom of this insistence is a kindly 
motive, but I venture to say their 
frame of mind has added more to the 
world's discomfort than would a peck 
of pins. And I suspect that this ap- 

104 



FltET 

parent thoughtfulness has, like most 
of our motives, a selfish taint. Per- 
haps it would not disturb them very 
much if someone should swallow an 
anchor, so long as they were not con- 
nected with the mishap. Exaltation 
of the ego and overinsistence go hand 
in hand ; in fact most of these faulty 
mental habits are so dovetailed that 
if we are subject to one we are likely 
to partake also of the remainder. 
This is a further reason for taking up 
mind-training as a whole. 

While some people are polite to 
strangers and "take it out" on their 
intimates, others reverse the process 
and are quite affable among their 
friends but absolutely rude to those 
they do not know. In the latter class 
fall the uncomfortable travelers and 
the inconsiderate users of the .tele- 
phone. Did you ever notice that half 
the people who call you by mistake 
say, in a petulant voice, "Ring off, 
please," or "I don't want you," or 

105 



PEG ALONG 

even "Get off the line." The chances 
are that in this same unreasonable half 
fall the ones that, when you call them 
by mistake say, "Why don't you find 
out what you want before you bother 
everybody on the line, ' ' or something 
equally unpleasant. A certain pas- 
senger in the subway being roughly 
pushed one day by a lady (the men 
do it, too), stepped aside, removed his 
hat, and begged her pardon for ob- 
structing her passage. She stopped, 
and like one suddenly awakened from 
a dream, exclaimed, "Why, what was 
I doing, and I was not even in a 
hurry." She had apparently become 
a victim of mob psychology, and had 
developed an impatience which was 
really quite fictitious. If she should 
move about some day among the 
guests in her own drawing-room as 
she was proceeding through the trav- 
eling public that day, she would be 
regarded as having suddenly lost her 
mind. All of which shows, not only 

106 



FRET 

that fret and impatience are largely 
matters of external circumstances, 
but that anyone can control them if 
he tries. Then why not try it all the 
time, and finally replace a faulty 
habit of mind by a good one % 

The contrast among things that fret 
people offers an interesting subject 
of study. One man can hardly think 
connectedly while the grate is being 
filled. Another would not mind if a 
coal chute was established in his 
study, but he cannot bear to hear a 
person clear his throat. I know 
plenty of people who cannot stand 
the tick of a timepiece, and who 
would not mind being stared in the 
face by 10.15 for the rest of their 
lives, whereas it would require all the 
philosophy I possess for me to toler- 
ate a dead clock half an hour. Verily 

The world is full of fools, 
And he who would not see an ass, 

Must bide at home and bolt the door 
And break his looking glass. 
107 



VIII 

FEAR 

Be not too fond of peace, 
Lest in pursuance of the goodly quarry, 
Thou meetest a disappointment that distracts thee. 

Thomas Ordivay 

A postmaster recently told me of a 
lady who appeared at the window 
and asked if they sold stamps. On 
being told they did, she asked to see 
them. A sheet of stamps was placed 
before her, upon which she pointed 
to one in the centre and said, "I'd 
like that one." 

I can only explain the occurrence 
by supposing the lady had a fear of 
contamination, so chose the stamp 
least likely to be infected. At all 
events her action was quite in accord 
with that of the many sufferers from 
these exaggerated fears known as 
phobias. Life for such individuals 
means a succession of shudders. For 
the person so afflicted external cir- 

108 



FEAR 

cumstances matter little. Thus, it 
was of a time and place in which real 
dangers existed that Mr. Obaldistone 
said "Of all the propensities which 
teach mankind to torment themselves, 
that of causeless fear is the most irri- 
tating, busy, painful and pitiable. " 
The same observation applies to-day 
to persons enjoying practically per- 
fect safety. 

The cultivation of courage lies in 
the power of everyone, but many, in- 
stead of cultivating courage, demand 
constant reassurance. A lady, find- 
ing the statement in one of my books 
that anyone can wear low shoes and 
thin underwear, writes to know if I 
think she can do so. In other words, 
she is too timid to try so simple an 
experiment as this without a special 
guarantee of safety. Though I do 
not advocate sitting in cold storage 
without appropriate clothing, I am 
sure that more harm is done by always 
seeking warmth and comfort than by 

109 



PEG ALONG 

moderate exposure to the elements. 
The cold bath, feared by many, is not 
recommended in the expectation that 
the sensitive will find the temperature 
agreeable, but because of the tonic 
after-effect, and the bracing pleasure 
of emergence from the quick, cold 
plunge. 

The forms of fear that assail the 
constitutional coward are multitudi- 
nous and sometimes queer, 

As when a gryphon through the wilderness 
With winged course o'er hill or moory dale 
Pursues the Aramaspian. 

The self-centred worrier fears that, 
by some trifling error, he has for- 
feited a friendship, where the philoso- 
pher would simply say, "It is not 
vital. If he likes me, everything I do 
will be right, and if he doesn't every- 
thing I do will be wrong. " 

I have known a mother who fears 

to feed her child lest he choke. I have 

known a wife to beg her husband, a 

stalwart specimen of physical health, 

no 



FEAR 

to cancel a business appointment and 
stay at home because the streets were 
slippery. I have known a man to for- 
feit his passage to Europe, besides 
throwing the whole party into con- 
fusion, because at the last minute he 
could not muster courage to cross the 
ocean, even on a modern liner in time 
of peace. I have heard of a couple 
who bid fair to be separated for life, 
because the wife, having crossed the 
ocean, does not dare return, and the 
husband will not venture to join her. 
The story is told (probably out of 
whole cloth) of a soldier who, on com- 
ing home from the trenches, was 
afraid to get into bed until the sheets 
were warmed. Even if the tale were 
true, it would be no more surprising 
than some of the contrasts in real life, 
for our fears are not always measured 
by the actuality of the danger, but 
more often by some motive peculiar 
to ourselves. I know a man who has 
more fear of a bumblebee than of a 
111 



PEG ALONG 

rattlesnake, another who has more 
fear of being laughed at than either, 
and still another who is so fearful he 
will turn red that he eschews society 
and is rapidly becoming a hermit for 
the sake of gratifying his obsession to 
blush unseen and waste his sweetness 
on the desert air. To some, the most 
harmless of the wriggling world 
strikes terror. I have a friend, in 
many ways courageous, who can 
hardly read without a shudder the 
verse of Fletcher : 

Do not fear to put thy feet 

Naked in the river sweet; 

Think not leech or newt or toad 

Will bite thy foot, where thou hast trod. 

When it comes to the fears of the 
hypochrondriac, no organ of the body 
is exempt from his anxious scrutiny. 
It is on these fears that the medical 
advertiser plays. More than one 
physically healthy man dares not step 
over his own curbstone for fear of 
some impending ill he cannot or will 
112 



FEAR 

not define. Such fearsome ones are 
prone to give every reason but the real 
one for not venturing forth to take the 
chances others do. 

It is not always fear for himself 
that disturbs the constitutionally 
timid. There are men who can hardly 
start upon the day's work without 
telephoning back to satisfy themselves 
that they have not left the door un- 
locked, the furnace on draught, or the 
water running, or a match on the floor. 
Caution is a very worthy virtue, but if 
it interferes with the performance of 
our daily duties it becomes a crime. 
Even the gadabout who never stays in 
for fear of missing something has the 
better of her neighbor who never goes 
out for fear something will boil over. 
I have been told that a certain well- 
known divine was so anxious about his 
children's health that he used to wake 
them in the night to ask how they were 
feeling. Some men can work them- 
selves into a fever of fret if they see a 

8 113 



PEG ALONG 

banana peel on the sidewalk. If 
asked why not simply pitch it into the 
gutter and let it go at that, they draw 
so vivid a picture of the poor work- 
ingman who is to slip on the banana 
peel, break his leg and be laid up for 
an indefinite period, that the hearer 
is almost moved to tears. 

While these imaginary dangers are 
occupying the minds of some of our 
introspective friends, Kitchner and 
the Kaiser are sending millions to cer- 
tain destruction, and yet can "peg 
along. ' ' No more tender-hearted man 
than Abraham Lincoln ever lived, but 
he did not allow his solicitude for the 
soldier to disturb his mental balance, 
or make him let go the wheel. If 
everyone whose occupation endan- 
gered human life should abandon that 
occupation through dwelling on the 
possible dangers, the work of the 
world would be seriously menaced. 
This some of our oversensitive friends 
would readily allow, but of themselves 

114 



FEAR 

they must make an exception. Their 
proposition may be stated somewhat 
as follows: In order that the world's 
business may be carried on, someone 
must run the risk of injuring others. 
But I will not run any such risk. It 
is true that if everybody should take 
my view the world's business would 
come to a standstill and we should all 
go to the bow-wows, but it isn't my 
funeral and I don't care. 

Solicitude for others may be syn- 
onymous with selfishness, as is shown 
when, after an accident, some tender- 
hearted but uninjured person goes 
into hysterics, and diverts attention 
from those who really need it. 

Some worriers can work themselves 
into a state of trepidation over retro- 
spective dangers — like the patient 
who called the doctor in the middle of 
the night to ask whether he ought to 
have eaten clams for supper! The 
fears of others focus on the future, as 
in the case of the man who suddenly 

115 



PEG ALONG 

awoke during a lecture to hear that 
the world would come to an end in 
fifty million years. "What did you 
say?" he asked in terrified accents. 
" Fifty million years/' was the calm 
reply. "My God!" he exclaimed, "I 
thought you said fifteen million," and 
he resumed his nap. 

It certainly should be within the 
bounds of reason to expect even the 
most timorous to practise indiffer- 
ence to distant dangers. Nor is it so 
difficult as some think gradually to 
cultivate mental relaxation even when 
immediate danger threatens. In this, 
as in all forms of mental training, the 
first step is to establish the ideal. 
Montaigne says: " Nevertheless, ey- 
ther I flatter myself e, or in this plight 
there is yet something that would f aine 
keep life and soul together, namely in 
him whose life is free from feare of 
death, and from the threats, conclu- 
sions and consequences which phy- 
sicke is ever buzzing in our heads." 

116 



IX 

PLAYING THE MARTYR 

Most of us have suffered from a certain sort of 
ladies who, by their perverse unselfishness, give 
more trouble than the selfish, who almost clamor 
for the unpopular dish and scramble for the worst 
seat. 

Chesterton '("What is Wrong with the World") 

The next time you have occasion to 
consult the Century Dictionary look 
at the illustration of the Aleuropus 
melanoleucus of Thibet. His air of 
mild reproach and habitual resigna- 
tion reminds me of a lady I once met 
who rejoiced in a state of perpetual 
martyrdom. Her manner further im- 
plied a quiet insistence that you be 
miserable also. Indeed, you were 
tempted to do so until you came to 
realize that, far from being miserable 
herself, she was really having the time 
of her life. To have been forced to 
accept a favor would have disap- 

117 



PEG ALONG 

pointed her. To have been in a state 
of complete physical comfort would 
have made her really as unhappy as 
she looked. Just as a man with a de- 
fective voice is always trying it, so the 
martyr of this type, if he happen to 
have a lame leg, will insist on standing 
in the public conveyance, even when 
there is plenty of room on the seat. 

The state of being abused is a very 
prevalent one. Even those who do not 
claim that they are themselves the 
objects of persecution are prone to 
feel that injustice is done their race, 
social class or sex. 

Self-inflicted martyrdom, like the 
" delusion of persecution/' means 
morbid exaltation of the ego, hence 
the chronic martyr may well ponder 
the observation of Charles Kings- 
bury: "If you want to be miserable, 
think about yourself, about what you 
want, what you like, what respect 
people ought to pay you, and what 
people think of you." Or that of 

118 



PLAYING THE MARTYR 

Charles Parkliurst : " A man who lives 
only by himself and for himself is apt 
to be corrupted by the company he 
keeps. " 

If we must focus on miseries, we 
shall do better to choose the miseries 
of somebody else. And even then, it 
is a waste of solicitude to focus on 
them too intently, unless we can do 
something to lighten them. All this 
is platitudinous, I know, but if we all 
tacted on such platitudes, the world 
would be a very tidy place to live in. 

"Don't eat nettles," someone has 
said, "only one animal does that." 
But constitutional martyrdom means 
eating nettles all the time, like the 
man of whom the poet wrote : 

He likes yours little, and his own still less; 
Thus always teasing others, always teased, 
His only pleasure is to be displeased. 

I dare say we all know some elderly 
fledgling who, in early life, lacked the 
courage, or the initiative, to try her 
wings, but chose rather to stay at 

119 



PEG ALONG 

home and live on the bounty of those 
she fancied she was caring for. All 
her life she has demanded sympathy, 
if not material assistance, because she 
too could have accomplished some- 
thing in the world, if she hadn't sacri- 
ficed herself to her parents. 

Even the burglar has his troubles, 
if one may judge by an amusing and 
instructive article in the New York 
Sun, giving the other fellow's point 
of view. This was the complaint of 
one of that fraternity regarding the 
frequency with which perfectly good 
business undertakings in his line are 
ruined because everybody in the house 
has to wake up when the baby cries. 
One really couldn't help sympathiz- 
ing with the poor man, especially 
when, after annexing a fine diamond 
ring in one house he was startled into 
dropping it in the next. 

The acme of self-inflicted martyr- 
dom is shown by the so-called delu- 
sions of persecution. These are best 
120 



PLAYING THE MARTYR 

seen in the subjects of the mental dis- 
order commonly known as paranoia. 
"Whatever may be the exact diagnosis 
of the individual case, a matter too 
technical to interest us here, the para- 
noid condition is so often mentioned 
in the courts and in the daily press 
that it seems worth while briefly to 
answer the question so often asked, 
"What is paranoia?" 

The victim of paranoia may be, and 
often is, in some directions, excep- 
tionally bright. His keenness in argu- 
ment may make the examiner use his 
best wits to hold his own, if indeed he 
succeed in doing so. The trouble with 
the paranoiac is that his reasoning 
processes, however brilliant, are dis- 
torted through his fixed, erroneous 
ideas regarding his relations to so- 
ciety. The erroneous idea may be, 
for example, that he is the victim of a 
conspiracy. 

Let me illustrate. Here is a young 
man of excellent memory and acute 
121 



PEG ALONG 

powers of observation. Some of his 
friends are ready to bear witness that 
he is mentally sound, others think he 
is peculiar. The casual observer sees 
nothing out of the way about him. In 
the course of a continued conversa- 
tion it appears that he is firmly of the 
belief that some fraternal organiza- 
tion is working against him. If a 
stranger asks him the time, the ques- 
tion is symbolic of something con- 
nected with that organization. While 
having his shoes blacked one day at 
a seaside resort, someone recom- 
mended a certain hostelry. This 
seemed to him such a suspicious cir- 
cumstance that he went to a different 
resort. There he was met by a man 
who also recommended a lodging 
place. This combination of circum- 
stances absolutely settled the question 
that he was surrounded by a network 
of spies working in the interest of the 
fraternal organization. In the train 
two passengers, strangers to him, con- 
122 



PLAYING THE MARTYR 

versed in a low tone, and he thought 
they must be talking about him, espe- 
cially since it chanced that one of them 
wore a necktie of a peculiar hue. On 
his attempting to find out directly 
from such people the meaning of their 
acts, they either show indifference or 
answer him evasively, a fact which 
only aggravates his suspicions. Asked 
how he can explain that a fraternal or- 
ganization to which he does not be- 
long should take such an interest in 
his proceedings, he frankly allows he 
cannot understand it, but he still 
thinks the evidence overwhelming. 
These thoughts occupy his mind to 
such a degree that for some time he 
has been incapable of pursuing his 
occupation, but spends his time in fol- 
lowing up clues. 

The term "systematic" has been 
applied to such delusions, meaning 
that the ideas are coherent and the 
reasoning perfectly logical, the men- 
tal twist being shown chiefly by the in- 

123 



PEG ALONG 

correct premises from which the pa- 
tient reasons. In other words, if he 
were really the object of persecution 
by a fraternal organization, all these 
things would be possible. So long as 
the injured party keeps his counsel 
and takes no step to free himself from 
his imaginary shackles no harm is 
done, except to himself. But the 
paranoiac is often a troublesome and 
even dangerous member of the com- 
munity through his attempt to ob- 
tain redress in the courts, if not by 
violence. It seems to be a case, in 
his mind, of the world against the in- 
dividual, which sometimes causes the 
belief that he has the right to avail 
himself of any weapon which comes 
to hand. And in seeking this redress 
the paranoiac is so constituted that it 
is difficult, if not impossible, for him 
to realize that those who Have to de- 
cide against him may be actuated by 
worthy motives. He views with ex- 
treme disfavor those who do not help 

124 



PLAYING THE MAKTYR 

him, and regards as malignant foes 
those who are obliged, by virtue of 
their office, to take part in curbing 
his activities. 

The difficulty in adjudicating these 
cases lies in the fact that the patient's 
mind is so clear, aside from his delu- 
sions, that those to whom he has not 
divulged them can truthfully bear 
witness that he has never exhibited 
in their presence the least sign of men- 
tal unsoundness. 

A gentleman complained to the 
police that the people in his boarding 
house annoyed him. His statements* 
aroused the suspicions of the officer in 
charge, who referred him for ex- 
amination to an alienist. The alienist 
reported that he was paranoid, but 
that it was not wise to take steps 
against him unless he committed some 
overt act or in some way made him- 
self troublesome. The complainant 
promptly sued the police, the doctor, 
and a former colleague, whom he re- 

125 



PEG ALONG 

garde d as the source of his persecu- 
tion, and whom he was sure he saw 
in hiding at the time of his examina- 
tion by the doctor. He enlisted the 
sympathy of a lawyer who undertook 
his case, opening with a very effec- 
tive plea, setting forth the humilia- 
tion to a sane man of being subjected 
to such an examination. The plaintiff 
testified in his own behalf, and made 
an excellent impression until it came 
to the cross-examination, when he al- 
lowed that he believed his former col- 
league to be at the head of the con- 
spiracy, and that at least three inde- 
pendent fraternal organizations were 
in league against him. At this point 
the case was dismissed by the Court. 
It is true that the ordinary " mar- 
tyr" is not likely to drift into para- 
noia, for this disease is probably the 
result of an inherent tendency which 
is bound, sooner or later, to develop. 
At the same time, it seems wise that 
such well-established types of in- 

126 



PLAYING THE MARTYR 

sanity should be generally known, so 
that, for example, when an imagina- 
tive individual finds himself inclined 
to think that everyone is down on him, 
he may at least say to himself, "I 
must nip this tendency in the bud. 
Whatever I do, I will not become a 
paranoiac. " 

Upon the question of sharing tech- 
nical knowledge with the public, there 
may be, and doubtless is, a division of 
opinion. The present trend, however, 
is so generally in favor of laying all 
medical matters open for inspection, 
that it is hardly worth while to argue 
upon the advisability of discussing 
one more detail. For myself, I do not 
share the fear that a knowledge of in- 
sanity will add to the anxiety of the 
worrier lest he become insane. On 
the contrary, I believe that knowledge 
of the real types of insanity is less 
likely to lead to apprehension than the 
vague and formless pictures of " mad- 
ness ' ? conjured by the ignorant. Con- 

127 



PEG ALONG 

trary to the popular opinion, I think 
I am right in saying that insanity is 
comparatively rare among alienists. 
Their very familiarity with mental 
disturbances helps them to see them- 
'selves as others see them, and to keep 
their own faulty mental habits within 
bounds. Constant association with, 
and study of, those unable to keep 
their place in the world helps the ob- 
server to avoid some of the pitfalls 
in the way of mental balance and to 
"peg along. " One should not be too 
deeply influenced by the saying, "A 
little knowledge is a dangerous 
thing. " Ignorance is sometimes dan- 
gerous, too. 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

Enjoy the present and quite distrust the morrow. 
The wise gods keep in Caligian darkness the events 
of the future, and smile at mortals who would look 
beyond. Horace 

In managing our life, as in running 
an automobile, the future is more im- 
portant than the past, and the present 
more important than either. Not that 
the philosopher, any more than the 
chauffeur, should quite ignore the road 
to come, or even the surroundings, but 
his immediate concern is with the road 
directly before him. If he cannot 
negotiate that, his j ourney is a failure, 
however accurately he may plan to- 
morrow's run, or remember that of 
yesterday. 

I fancy that perfect spiritual com- 
fort is only attainable by dropping 
the past entirely out of mind, and tak- 
ing absolutely no thought for the 

9 129 



PEG ALONG 

future. This is not quite feasible, ex- 
cepting for the idiot, so that we can 
hardly expect perfect happiness on 
this planet. At the same time, it is 
within our power to modify our 
chronic discontent and to become ap- 
proximately happy, hence useful, by 
neither morbidly focussing upon the 
unalterable past nor insistently fore- 
casting the unknown future, remem- 
bering that 

What's past and what's to come is strewed with 

husks 
And formless ruin of oblivion. 

Did you ever find yourself walking 
one way while you were looking 
another? If so, you were perhaps 
brought up with a round turn by run- 
ning into something and hearing 
somebody say, "Look where you're 
going !" Many of us, so far as our 
minds go, are doing this all the time. 
We are apparently busying ourselves 
about the work of to-day, but our 
mental vision is upon things of the 

130 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

past. The mistakes we have made, 
the bad luck that has pursued us, and 
the hard knocks we have received 
loom large. Some of us even go so 
far as to focus on a single misfortune, 
which is so prominent as to blot out 
everything else, both past and pres- 
ent. Some constitutionally unhappy 
people actually believe that if they 
had been sent to a different school, or 
if they had taken up another occupa- 
tion, they would be to-day successful 
and happy. But the chances are that 
the discontent and the failure, if there 
has been failure, would have been 
present, just the same, if some fairy 
with power surpassing any fairy yet 
invented could grant their melancholy 
wish. 

We have all heard of the smoker 
who was told by his friend that if he 
had never smoked he could have 
bought a house with the proceeds — 
to which he retorted, " "Where is your 
house ?" I never quite understood 

131 



PEG ALONG 

where the fallacy came in, but it has 
occurred to me that one reason for the 
fact that the personal expenses are 
not materially increased by smoking, 
is that whereas a cigar by the fireside 
is sufficient entertainment for hours 
on end, the non-smoker is thrown 
more upon various external resources, 
which in the long run prove more ex- 
pensive than the tobacco. Similarly, 
if the worrier about school or choice 
of occupation had gone to another 
school or taken up another profession, 
he might perhaps have found that 
what he gained in one way had been 
lost in another. In short, the whole 
question of what "might have been" 
is altogether problematical. Coup- 
ling this with the fact that even if we 
could solve the problem we should 
gain nothing by the solution, and add- 
ing thereto the fact that the backward 
gaze only puts us in the way of 
stumbling over something directly be- 
fore us, it seems pertinent, when we 

132 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

find ourselves casting more than an 
occasional glance into the past, to 
bring ourselves up with the shout, 
"Look where you are going!" To 
worry over the irrevocable past is 
about as sensible as to worry over the 
immutable laws of nature, for exam- 
ple, because water will not run uphill. 
All of which wisdom has been epito- 
mized in the admonition, Do not cry 
over spilt milk. 

Ask the average person who has lost 
his pocketbook what he is going to do 
next and his answer is quite likely to 
be, "If I hadn't lost my pocketbook I 
should have done so and so," and half 
our plans are laid on similar lines. 

Mr. A., who has none too much time 
to catch his train, misses his gloves. 
On looking in the usual place he fails 
to find them, and asks his wife if she 
knows where they are. The chances 
arie he receives some such reply as : 

"You ought to have put them in 
that drawer," and unless Mr. A. is 

133 



PEG ALONG 

very well trained lie snaps out some- 
thing like this : 

"I didn't ask where they ought to 
be," and rushes for the train. 

I called up a book store the other 
day to see if they had a certain vol- 
ume I greatly wished, and which was 
out of print. The answer was, "We 
have had one of them in stock for 
months, but just sold it yesterday." 

Over the telephone when you ask 
if Mr. So and So is in, you often get 
the answer, "He has just this minute 
stepped out." 

"Can you tell me when he will be 
in % I am anxious to see him as soon 
as possible." 

"If you had called just one minute 
earlier you would have caught him. ' ' 

"Do you know when he will be 
back?" 

"He generally leaves word, but to- 
day he neglected to." 

"Do you know where I can find 
him?" 

134 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

"Any other day but to-day you 
could have found him at his office, 
but to-day he said he was going out 
of town." 

In a hurry one day to find a drug 
store on Tremont Street, I looked for 
Metcalf ? s, but found that Metcalf had 
moved. I then hurried down to City 
Hall Avenue, looking for Percival's 
on the corner, only to find that Perci- 
val had also disappeared. I then in- 
quired in a store near by if there was 
not some druggist in the neighbor- 
hood. After considerable delibera- 
tion, the clerk replied : 

"Well, let me see, there used to be 
a druggist right on the corner here 
next doo>, but he has gone." 

"Yes, I know," said I, "but I want 
to know if there is not some other." 

"Well, let me see, Metcalf used to 
have a store up on Tremont Street, 
but he is gone, too." 

Nor is this tendency altogether a 
one-sided one, for it is not unusual for 

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PEG ALONG 

the inquirer himself, on being told that 
a person has gone out, to ask, ' ' When 
did he go?" A friend with whom I 
took a Southern trip has so often told 
the following story at my expense that 
I may as well utilize it. I was careful 
to wire ahead for accommodations, but 
at a certain stopping place the rooms 
were all occupied. My telegram, it 
seems, had given the wrong date. 
"Well, could we have had a room," 
he describes me as anxiously inquir- 
ing, "if the date had been correct?" 

We often form so insistent a picture 
of what we ought to have done that it 
blurs our vision and paralyzes our 
energy. This is much as if the pilot, 
instead of avoiding the rocks in the 
course, should devote his time to wish- 
ing he had chosen another. This means 
energy worse than wasted, for it makes 
for the mental unrest that unfits us for 
the duties we have before us, for 

To mourn a mischief that is past and gone 

Is the next way to draw new mischief on. 

136 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

To curb the undue prolongation of 
past emotions we must take a lesson 
of some of the lower animals. I was 
sitting, one day, by an open window 
at the top of the house, when a spar- 
row alighted upon the blind. The 
morsel was so tempting that the cat, 
apparently forgetting her surround- 
ings, sprang to secure it, missing her 
prey, and only refraining from miss- 
ing the house as well, by the margih 
of about one claw. From this slight 
hold she made a frantic effort, with 
every sign of distress, to scramble 
back. Once safely landed, with my 
assistance, she extended herself upon 
the sofa, and in a moment was purr- 
ing away as comfortably as if noth- 
ing had happened. It is safe to say 
that a similar experience would have 
upset the average human being for 
at least twenty-four hours, with re- 
current shudders for an indefinite 
period. 

137 



PEG ALONG 

A common stumbling block in the 
way of living in the present is the 
"New England Conscience. " The 
possessor of this unlucky gift is pur- 
sued by the fear that he has done 
wrong. He can never take comfort 
till he has made reparation for some 
trifling if not imaginary peccadillo. 
The lady of whom the following 
stories are told must have been a 
classical example of this malady. In 
the street car, one day, she sat by a 
gentleman who was reading the news- 
paper. A certain heading caught her 
eye, and she suddenly realized that 
she was reading over his shoulder. 
Overwhelmed with mortification she 
called his attention to the fact, and 
offered him a penny for the share of 
1 the news she had inadvertently ap- 
propriated ! On another occasion she 
thoughtlessly plucked a dandelion on 
the Common — this necessitated her 
stepping on the grass, which dis- 
turbed her so much that she had to 

138 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

ease lier conscience by going to the 
State House to report herself as hav- 
ing been guilty of this offense. 

A certain witness after leaving the 
stand remembered that he had made 
a misstatement regarding his relation- 
ship to another witness, a matter hav- 
ing no bearing on the question at issue 
in the case. On calling the lawyer's 
attention to the fact he was told that 
so long as it was immaterial he must 
give it no further thought. But the 
witness persisted that having made a 
misstatement it ought to be corrected, 
and it almost required physical re- 
straint to prevent his interrupting the 
court by attempting to take the stand 
again on his own initiative. 

Mental relaxation is impossible for 
a person whose mind is filled with re- 
morse and anxiety on account of in- 
cidents like these. Such individuals 
should cultivate living in the present 
and learn to drop their scrupulous ret- 
rospection. They should realize that 

139 



PEG ALONG 

it is wrong to make their own peace of 
mind paramount in affairs affecting 
the interest of others, that their queru- 
lous insistence is a hindrance in the 
conduct of affairs, in short that they 
should let a few trifling errors go, and 
"peg along. " 

Living in the future is not to be 
dismissed as lightly as living in the 
past. In fact, we must do some living 
in the future in order to lay our plans. 
Before starting out upon a journey 
we instinctively picture ourselves go- 
ing through the various steps of that 
journey. Without this play of the 
imagination we should often be at a 
loss. Nevertheless, these mental pict- 
ures should not be so insistently im- 
printed that we cannot modify them. 
Nor should their details be so vivid 
as to blur our view of present duties. 
To recur to the analogy between run- 
ning one's life and running the auto- 
mobile, if you are to run the automo- 

' 140 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

bile yourself you take lessons, you ob- 
serve, and practise. Everything to do 
with its management has to do with 
the present. Similarly, you learn, or 
should learn, something about the im- 
mediate management of your mind. It 
is with a view to this phase of the sub- 
ject that living in the future is taboo. 
After you have learned to run your 
automobile, or have acquired a chauf- 
feur and learned to run him (some- 
times more difficult, I am told, than 
to run the machine), you have the 
future to consider. Having worn out 
the roads in your immediate vicinity, 
you plan, unless you are satisfied with 
the humdrum, more extensive jour- 
neys. Likewise in planning your life, 
you decide, perhaps, that you will stick 
to business until you are carried out 
of the office in your coffin, or, on the 
other hand, you make up your mind 
that you will gradually relinquish the 
details, and devote your extra hours 
to the outside pursuits which are to 

141 



PEG ALONG 

keep you from flying off at a tangent 
when you retire. It is not such plan- 
ning in its place, that I deplore. 
Those also are at fault who quite neg- 
lect it. But we are only studying, 
just now, the practical philosophy 
that will enable us to proceed about 
our immediate affairs without stress. 
Even when the future does not ma- 
terialize according to our plan, if we 
have practised such philosophy as has 
been outlined, we shall have acquired 
the power to bear disappointment 
with comparative serenity, and lay 
our plan anew. Whether we decide 
to become a writer, a painter, a states- 
man, or a King of the Cannibal 
Islands, and the higher we aim the 
farther we shall doubtless get, all this 
can run along without interfering 
with the immediate management of 
the mind, so long as we refrain from 
forecasting too insistently the details 
of our picture. 

Suppose, after such deliberation as 

142 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

the case deserves, I have decided to 
embark upon a certain undertaking, 
if I allow my mind to stray, during 
business hours, into the fields of spec- 
ulation as to the outcome of the under- 
taking, I am attempting two things 
at once, just as the player in a tourna- 
ment onty impedes his game by let- 
ting his mind wander from the shot 
in hand to the question of winning or 
losing the prize. 

Our attitude toward the dentist is 
a good illustration of energy wasted 
•on forebodings for the future. In 
this connection I cannot improve upon 
Annie Payson Call: 

"The fatigue which results from an 
hour or more of this dentist tension 
is too well known to need description. 
Most of the nervous fatigue suffered 
from the dentist's work is in conse- 
quence of the unnecessary strain of 
expecting a hurt, and not from any 
actual pain inflicted. The result ob- 
tained by insisting upon making your- 

143 



PEG ALONG 

self a dead weight in the chair, if you 
succeed only partially, will prove this. 
It will also be a preliminary means of 
getting well rid of the dentist fright — 
that peculiar dread which is so well 
known to most of us." 

So well known indeed to some of us 
as to shut out the sunlight for weeks 
before the fatal date, the dread in- 
creasing steadily, till, by the time the 
chair is reached, a state of tension has 
been attained that precludes the pos- 
sibility of letting ourselves " go dead." 
But one can drop all this by a little 
effort, and sa3^ to himself, "I will not 
cry till I am hurt." In fact he can 
not only acquire the power to become 
a dead weight in the chair, but will 
finally give no more thought to the 
dentist's appointment than to a date 
at the Golf Club. Just try this ex- 
periment instead of arguing about it. 

If the philosophy of living in the 
present is applied merely to the pur- 
suit of ease, injustice is done the 

144 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

theme. To live in the present is quite 
as important when we work as when 
we play. In fact, the first requisite 
for effective work is to acquire the 
power to focus the attention on the 
duties immediately at hand, dropping 
regrets for past mistakes, and dis- 
missing fears of future ones. In cul- 
tivating this power we make for use- 
fulness, incidentally for comfort. 
Peace of mind is oftener the product 
of work than of play, and oftener that 
of either than of revery. Upon learn- 
ing to work in this whole-hearted way, 
we soon come to realize how much of 
our former exhaustion was caused by 
trying to shoulder the whole day's 
work at once. 

It would hardly be fair to leave out 
the best known apostle of the phil- 
osophy of living in the present. I re- 
fer to the Persian astronomer-poet, 
Omar Khayyam, who said, 

Fill the cup that clears 

Today of past regrets and future fears. 

10 145 



PEG ALONG 

My only source of hesitation on this 
point is lest some too literal reader 
of the good Omar accuse me of extol- 
ling the wine cup above the heroic 
virtues. It is true that the juice of the 
grape plays a prominent part in the 
Quatrains of Omar ; it is also true that 
the Rubaiyat is somewhat lacking in 
suggestion that the ease and pleasure 
of to-day should be qualified by an 
occasional thought for the comfort 
of others, not to say the welfare of 
the community. In excusing this 
omission it may perhaps be pertinent 
to remind ourselves that, just as Epi- 
curus lived and wrote in a period 
during which Greece had so far fallen 
under the dominion of the Macedon- 
ian that patriotism seemed hopeless, 
and personal courage was at a dis- 
count, likewise Omar lived and wrote 
when his country was so completely 
under the sway of the Saracens that 
the history of Persia at that time is 
practically a blank. Philosophy to 

146 



LIVING IN THE PRESENT 

bear existing conditions was doubt- 
less, at that period, more to the point 
than were efforts to improve them. It 
must be remembered, too, that Omar 
really accomplished things, for ex- 
ample, the regulation of the calendar 
and the issuance of an algebra, show- 
ing that his ambition was not quite 
bounded by the delight of the tavern 
and the sunny bank. 

No less practical and energetic a 
statesman than our own John Hay 
(in an address before the Omar Khay- 
yam Club of London) described his 
emotions on first seeing Fitzgerald's 
translation of the Quatrains by quot- 
ing Keats : 

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies, 
When a new planet swims into his ken. 

And, furthermore, he continued: 
"The exquisite beauty, faultless form 
and singular grace of these amazing 
stanzas were not more wonderful than 
the depth and breadth of their pro- 
found philosophy, their knowledge of 

147 



PEG ALONG 

life, their dauntless courage, their 
serene facing of the ultimate prob- 
lems of life and death/' If the hard- 
headed, albeit soft-hearted, states- 
man could read all this in the lines 
of the Rubaiyat we may safely assume 
that we have ourselves to blame if we 
cannot do the same. We may at least, 
with all due reference to the needs 
and duties of our time, and with due 
allowance for the "Weltschmerz" of 
his, permit ourselves to become some- 
what infected by his philosophy, even 
though we may not altogether ac- 
quiesce in his devotion to the wine 
skin. 



XI 

WORK AND PLAY 

Hidrdis. How goes it with thee, my husband ? 
Gunnar. Ill, Hiordis; I cannot away with that 

deed of yesterday ; it lies heavy on my 

heart. 
Hiordis. Do as I do; get thee some work to busy 

thee. ibsen 

Have you heard the story of the two 
frogs in the can of milk? It seems 
that the one who first gave up sank 
and was drowned. The other kept 
kicking till the butter came, upon 
which he jumped out. The moral is, 
keep busy. 

I was on the point of saying that 
any occupation is better than con- 
tinued idleness, when I was reminded 
of the danger of generalization by 
running across the remark of Prince 
Henry: "I am not yet of Percy's 
mind, the Hotspur of the North, he 
that kills me some six or seven Scots 

149 



PEG ALONG 

at a breakfast, washes his hands and 
says to his wife, 'Fie upon this quiet 
life ! I want work ! ' " 

At all events, almost any kind of 
work (or play) is better than doing 
nothing. Nor shall I be altogether 
guided by the admonition of the 
strenuous Bacon: " Therefore meas- 
ure not despatch by the times of sit- 
ting, but by the advancement of the 
business." It is precisely the obes- 
sion to accomplish things, in and out 
of season, that keeps us from occupy- 
ing ourselves in a reasonable manner. 
It is the besetting sin of the overin- 
sistent that he " wants to know" just 
what advantage is to be gained by do- 
ing this or that. It is better to file 
away our letters or rearrange our 
bookcase than to walk up and down 
bemoaning our lot in the world, or 
fretting over something we can't help. 
I have advised more than one home- 
ridden nervous invalid to hire an of- 
fice down town, and go to it regularly 

150 



WORK AND PLAY 

for an hour a day, even if all he does 
when lie gets there is "pigs in clover. " 
Of course I recommend by preference 
some occupation that is useful, par- 
ticularly if useful to others. A cer- 
tain individual had all the advantages 
the world had to offer, excepting the 
frame of mind to enjoy them. He was 
particularly worried about his chil- 
dren. It struck me as very a propos 
when a friend advised him to divert 
his attention from their little handi- 
caps by sending some poor boy to 
college. 

It is not always feasible for the 
f usser to arrange for himself, out of 
whole cloth, a ' ' steady job, ' ' but he can 
surely begin on some of the thousand 
and one interests waiting to be taken 
up, interests time and opportunity 
for which many long in vain. A 
friend of mine, an ardent lover of 
nature, was chained to the desk 
through his life. He used to tell me 
he would be perfectly happy if he 

151 



PEG ALONG 

could only get a ' ' day off ' ' once a week 
for study in the fields. But when the 
nervous invalid, with plenty of time 
on his hands, is urged to take up the 
study of birds, flowers or trees, he 
simply says he is not interested. Of 
course he is not; no one is interested 
in anything until he knows something 
about it, and the way to know some- 
thing about it is to go to work at it. 

When Aristotle was asked where 
j the Muses dwell, he answered, "In 
the minds of those who love work." 
The word "work" in this connection 
is not limited to the daily grind, but 
includes all forms of doing. Thomas 
a Kempis says: "To the same pur- 
pose, beware of Idleness; be con- 
stantly in Action, let Reading, or 
Writing, or Praying, or Meditating, 
or contriving somewhat for the Good 
of Others, employ your leisure 
Hours." 

Whenever I hear a melancholy man 
complain, "What is there in life for 

152 



WORK AND PLAY 

me?'' I always envy the preacher who 
can, without prejudice, suggest that 
he might try the experiment of seeing 
what he can put into it for somebody 
else. 

Work as an antidote for scrupulous 
imagining is no new suggestion. In 
Baleigh's Essays on Johnson we find 
the following: 

"In his happy retreat at Streatham 
Johnson would sometimes tell stories 
of his experiences. Once he told the 
following tale: A person (said he) 
had for these last five weeks often 
called at my door, but would not leave 
his name or other message, but that he 
wdshed to speak with me. At last we 
met, and he told me that he was op- 
pressed by scruples of conscience: I 
blamed him gently for not applying, 
as the rules of our church direct, to his 
parish priest or other discreet clergy- 
man; when, after some compliments 
on his part, he told me that he was 
clerk to a very eminent trader, at 

153 



PEG ALONG 

whose warehouse much business con- 
sisted in packing goods in order to go 
abroad : that he was often tempted to 
take paper and packthread enough for 
his own use, and that he had indeed 
done so so often, that he could recol- 
lect no time when he ever had bought 
any for himself. But probably (said 
I), your master was wholly indiffer- 
ent with regard to such trivial 
emoluments ; you had better ask for it 
at once, and so take your trifles with 
consent. Oh, Sir ! replied the visitor, 
my master bid me have as much as I 
pleased, and was half angry when I 
talked to him about it. Then pray. 
Sir (said I) teize me no more about 
such airy nothings — and was going to 
be very angry, when I recollected that 
the fellow might be mad perhaps ; so 
I asked him, When he left the count- 
ing house of an evening? At seven 
o'clock, Sir. And when do you go 
to bed, Sir 1 At twelve o 'clock. Then 
(replied I) I have at least learned 

154 



WORK AND PLAY 

thus much by my new acquaintance, 
that five hours of the four-and- 
twenty unemployed are enough for a 
man to go mad in ; so I would advise 
you, Sir, to study algebra, if you are 
not an adept already in it; your head 
would get less muddy, and you will 
leave off tormenting your neighbors 
about paper and packthread, while we 
all live together in a world that is 
bursting wtith sin and sorrow. 
* A certain impecunious grumbler 
was told by a frugal friend that if he 
saved a few hundred dollars a year, 
he would have, at the age of fifty, 
twenty thousand dollars drawing in- 
terest. " What's twenty thousand 
dollars ?" was the contemptuous re- 
joinder of the man who couldn't raise 
a nickel for an extra carfare. Simi- 
larly, the discontented worrier is 
prone to discount the benefits of occu- 
pation by the favorite maxim of the 
idle, " What's the use?" When we 
find ourselves drifting into this frame 

155 



PEG ALONG 

of mind we must remember the melan- 
choly character drawn by Overbury: 
"Unpleasing to all, as all to him; 
straggling thoughts are his content; 
they make him dreame waking, there 
is his pleasure. . . . He thinks busi- 
nesse, but never does any; he is all 
contemplation, not action. " 

It wouldn't be a bad idea for some 
of us to go back to school again. There 
is many a six-footer, pulling the scales 
at over two hundred, who ought to be 
squeezed into a seat at the primary 
school he went to long ago, and made 
to sing again at the top of his voice : 

Work while you work, 

Play while you play, 
This is the way 

To be cheerful and gay. 

It might mean something to him now, 
even if it didn't then. And when he 
had thoroughly assimilated the prac- 
tical philosophy contained in this 
simple song, he might on his way to 
business take a try at the Lucia Sex- 

156 



WORK AND PLAY 

tette instead of going over for the 
fortieth time the details of his day's 
work. His friends might think he 
was crazy, but he would be much more 
sane than he is to-day, and much bet- 
ter fitted for an effective day's work. 
It would clench the cure if the exer- 
cises at the store were started by five 
minutes' gymnastics, and if, after two 
hours' steady work, he had to take ten 
minutes recess in the open air. I 
wouldn't insist on his playing "Puss 
in the Corner," but a walk around the 
block would be better than nothing. 
These things he regards as reasonable 
for his children, who do not need them 
any more than he does, perhaps not so 
much, but he has no time for such 
silly interruptions! He chooses, in- 
stead, to take the chance -of going to a 
sanitarium later, for a recess of six 
months. 

Sir Walter Scott says, "I was not 
long, however, in making the grand 
discovery that, in order to enjoy lei- 

157 



PEG ALONG 

sure, it is absolutely necessary it 
should be preceded by occupation." 
The obvious corollary of this dis- 
covery is that, in order to enjoy work 
it should be interrupted at proper in- 
tervals by play. 

The distinction between work and 
play is not always to be sharply 
drawn. Most of us are obsessed to 
make hard work of work, but in the 
kindergarten many things are taught 
by play and, similarly, much of our 
work would be equally effective if 
made a game of. One can learn a list 
of names, or a page of history, just 
as easily by composing a simple mne- 
monic or a nonsense rhyme as by the 
humdrum method. By the time he 
has composed his rhyme he will find 
he has fixed his facts. Leverage makes 
a little strength go a great way. 

Conversely, to get the most pleasure 
out of play a little work should be in- 
jected. To ramble in the fields with- 
out an object gives little pleasure, but 

158 



WORK AND PLAY 

if the tired business man will launch 
himself into botany, even without 
prior leaning toward it, he will shortly 
come to feel keen pleasure in chasing 
the festive phanerogam up the fertile 
valley of the Naugatuck. This sup- 
plementary advice should not be for- 
gotten by the " virtuous and faithful 
Heberden" 

whose skill 
Attempts no task it cannot well fulfill, 
Gives Melancholy up to Nature's care, 
And sends the patient into purer air. 

The pleasure of skating soon palls 
if one is satisfied to skate round and 
round without an object. But if the 
skater takes a few lessons in the 
modern method, he will find the work 
greatly helps the play. Similarly, if 
one plays billiards no better to-day 
than he did ten years ago, he soon tires 
of knocking the balls about. But if he 
only take a half-dozen lessons from 
a professional, he will find himself 
practising for the fun of it, to say 

159 



PEG ALONG 

nothing of taking infinitely more 
pleasure in a real game than he ever 
did before. 

If any reader thinks the author is 
" talking through his hat," let him 
drop into the Arena some day next 
winter. The chances are he will see 
several so-called elderly men follow- 
ing this plan, at the risk of being ac- 
cused by their colleagues of wasting 
their time. In point of fact, it is the 
colleagues who are mistaken in think- 
ing they are making the most of their 
time and opportunities in going over, 
day after day, and all day, the same 
old details, half of which might just 
as well be entrusted to an assistant. 
To the man who insinuates that it 
takes very little to fill small minds, 
the obvious answer is, "Yes, your 
business alone seems to fill yours." 

Fashion has much to do with these 
matters. If it were the prevailing 
style to live reasonably, the man who 
worked all the time would be called a 

160 



WORK AND PLAY 

crank. But nowadays any excuse is 
enough to keep the average man from 
taking a vacation. One patient tells 
me that he would be glad to do so if 
he had a partner to carry on the work, 
and the next one says he would be glad 
to if he didn't have a partner who 
would think he was shirking ! 

It is the monotony that causes 
" brain fag." I dare say a man could 
work all day and every day if his 
work was sufficiently varied and in- 
teresting. If you had to saw wood all 
day you would deem it no waste of 
time to rest your back once in a while, 
indeed, if you didn't you could hardly 
be expected to last out. There is no 
reason why the more delicately ad- 
justed brain should not be given the 
same chance as the torso. So 

come at least without delay — 
Forget base lucre for a day! 

And mindful of the fire 
That soon may light our funeral-pile, 
We'll play the fool a little while, 
And from ourselves retire. 
11 161 



XII 

EMOTIONAL POISE 

Quiet minds cannot be perplexed or frightened, 
but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own 
private pace, like a clock during a thunderstorm. 

Stevenson 

If we could take a bird's eye view 
of ourselves, perhaps the first thing 
to attract our attention would be our 
inability to control our emotions even 
under moderate stress. Many of us 
fret our way through the world some- 
what after the fashion of a horse go- 
ing through a swarm of flies. Indeed, 
not a few of us, when merely experi- 
encing the ordinary discomforts inci- 
dent to life on this planet, act as if we 
had broken into a hornet's nest. 

In the majority of instances, this 
fretful frame of mind results not 
from the annoyances themselves so 
much as from our attitude toward 
them. Take, for example, the ques- 
tion of disagreeable noises. I am not 

162 



EMOTIONAL POISE 

the first to call attention to the fact 
that noises in themselves do not dis- 
turb us so much as our mental attitude 
toward them. To cite an illustration : 
My friend X has occasion to sleep 
above a street corner around which 
automobiles often proceed upon their 
way to a garage. At the corner the 
driver blows his horn, and at the door 
of the garage, unless the watchman is 
at hand, the signal is repeated. The 
would-be sleeper tells me he found 
that, from the first, the sounding of 
the horn on rounding the corner did 
not disturb him in the least; if it 
awoke him, he easily resumed his 
slumbers. When, on the other hand, 
the horn sounds at the garage, the 
noise still annoys him extremely. Be- 
fore he achieves the philosophic frame 
of mind toward this particular annoy- 
ance, he may have to say to himself, 
"Never touched me" a hundred times. 
And even then a toot of exceptional 
insistence will reproduce the less an- 

163 



PEG ALONG 

gelic frame of mind in all its old in- 
tensity. Yet the sound of the horn is 
the same at the corner as at the garage 
door. He is complacent regarding the 
one because it seems reasonable; he 
is incensed at the other because it 
violates his idea of the proprieties. 

Of course, certain sounds are in 
themselves annoying, perhaps injuri- 
ous, as hammering on metal, the clat- 
ter of unprotected pipes carted over 
an uneven pavement, or the loose tail- 
board of a tipcart. But if we pause to 
analyze our frame of mind regarding 
nine noises out of the ten which fret 
us, such as crying of children, crack- 
ling of steam pipes, barking of dogs, 
howling of cats, piano practice and a 
thousand other common noises, we 
come to realize the degree of annoy- 
ance they cause us is proportional to 
our resentment. Even a Klaxon heard 
from the machine does not have quite 
the sound it does on the street. Some 
things depend on the point of view, as 

164 



EMOTIONAL POISE 

the lawyer observed of expert testi- 
mony. "I have a little dog/' he said. 
"If I hold him he will bite you, but if 
you hold him he will bite me." 

It seems that there is an element of 
fashion in the question of self-control. 
Surely people do not faint as com- 
monly as they did in my boyhood, 
when it was an everyday occurrence 
for some young lady to be ministered 
to for emotional collapse. The smell- 
ing salts were much more in evidence 
then than now. I am inclined also to 
think that weeping and allied emo- 
tional outbreaks are less common than 
they were in the period when Rob 
Roy said it was "nae mair ferlie to 
see a woman greet than to see a goose 
gang barefit." Similarly, it seems to 
me that the "towering rage" is less 
in fashion now than it was in "ye 
olden tyme." In other words, I be- 
lieve there is, in this country at least, 
an increasing tendency to control the 
emotions. If this is true, in these 

165 



PEG ALONG 

days of ready exchange, it is evidence 
of a widespread modification of man- 
ners and customs, ushered in with the 
advent of the new woman, who repre- 
sents a revulsion from the Lydia 
Languish type. The question natu- 
rally arises, did the women formerly 
faint on purpose % Perhaps those did 
who were so gifted, but it was prob- 
ably as a rule a case, not of the women 
fainting on purpose, but of letting 
themselves faint. Certainly in the 
realm of rage we can easily see that 
a violent outbreak does not mean a 
voluntary act, but rather giving way 
to a tendency we all possess, but over 
which we exercise control. 

Giving up this sensitiveness, of 
which we are ashamed, involves giving 
up somewhat of the sensibility of 
which we are proud. Thus, suppose 
I am gifted with, or have acquired, so 
fine a color-sense that a certain wall- 
paper causes me to shudder. In this 
event I cannot rid myself of the dis- 

166 



EMOTIONAL POISE 

comfort without sacrificing something 
of the color-sense. The same is true 
of the sound-sense, through which a 
discord causes pain, and the sense of 
propriety that makes a toothpick in 
public unendurable. In such di- 
lemmas it is necessary to choose the 
horn. We cannot have our cake and 
eat it, too. In other words, if we 
really want to get well, we must sacri- 
fice something dear to us. 

That these repulsions are not physi- 
cal is shown by such instances as that 
of a certain ornithologist with an in- 
tolerance for red. It seems he actually 
avoided people wearing this color. 
But when it came to his feathered 
friends, instead of finding the color 
of the scarlet tanager abhorrent, this 
bird was one of his favorite finds. 

When our emotional poise is en- 
dangered by comments of the thought- 
less or malicious, we shall do well to 
have in mind the observation of Ben 
Jonson ("To Fool or Knave ") : 

167 



PEG ALONG 

Thy praise or dispraise is to me alike, 

One doth not stroke me, nor the other strike. 

In advising tlie cultivation of emo- 
tional poise and of adaptability to 
circumstances there are, of course, 
certain limitations to be borne in 
mind. Epictetus, who said, "Chas- 
tise your passions, that they may not 
chastise you," and who taught, by 
precept and example, the philosophic 
attitude toward annoyance, warns 
against carrying the theory to the 
point of sacrificing one's self-respect. 
"The estimation of one's own worth 
lies with himself," says Epictetus, 
quoting, in illustration of his mean- 
ing, Agrippinus, who, when Floras 
was deliberating whether he should 
go to Nero's shows, and perform some 
part in them himself, bade him go. 
"But why do you not go then?" says 
Floras. "Because," replies Agrip- 
pinus, "I do not deliberate about it." 
The same philosopher commends the 
athlete who died rather than undergo 

168 



EMOTIONAL POISE 

a humiliating operation, it being right 
that he should submerge the philos- 
opher in the man, the man in this case 
being one who had been proclaimed 
champion in the Olympic games. 

For the state of mind produced by 
unjust criticism, the following anec- 
dote, told by Archdeacon Wilberf orce, 
may be in place : A certain bishop was 
at one time deeply distressed by the 
persistent calumnies of a prominent 
layman. He wrote for advice to an 
eminent lawyer. The lawyer replied 
with a quotation from the Scriptures. 

" Jesus stood before the governor, 
and when He was accused of the chief 
priest and elders He answered noth- 
ing. Insomuch that the governor 
marvelled greatly." 

"Dear So and So," added the law- 
yer, "let the governor marvel." 

The practice of emotional control 
is particularly difficult for the indi- 
vidual so comfortably placed in life 
that he has had his own way from in- 

169 



PEG ALONG 

fancy. Such, an one must, indeed, be 
well-poised if he can bear with equa- 
nimity the buffets of later life. If 
there is any form of insanity into 
which such a person can drift by 
simple inertia it is the form known as 
' ' manic-depressive. ' ' This form I 
have elsewhere described at length as 
an extreme degree of the " moods, " 
whether hilarious or depressed, to 
which we are all subject. It is little 
likely that the child who is taught to 
keep within bounds his exuberance on 
the one hand, and his expressions of 
grief on the other, will drift into this 
form of mental disorder. 

When an individual with incon- 
trollable emotions has drifted into the 
state of agitated melancholy that 
characterizes the depressed form of 
" manic-depressive " his greatest fear 
is that he will become insane. He 
walks up and down wringing his 
Hands, unable to attend to the simplest 
duty, or to think of anything but his 

170 



EMOTIONAL POISE 

unhappy state. To his reiterated 
question, " Shall I go insane?" he re- 
ceives, as a rule, the stereotyped an- 
swer, "Of course not," which he 
knows very well means nothing. 
Would not this be the wiser answer : 
"It depends on yourself; insanity 
means simply that one is so under the 
dominance of his morbid mental ten- 
dencies that he cannot attend to his 
duties. If you go on as you are, you 
will be insane ; but if you control your 
emotions enough to attend to your af- 
fairs, even if you are blue, you will be 
no more insane than I am." This an- 
swer could not aggravate a condition 
which is already at its worst, and it 
might sometimes pave the way for the 
mental training which lessens the 
chances of another attack. 

At all events, it behooves those of us 
who have not yet overstepped the line 
to keep our emotions within reason- 
able bounds and 

Peg Along. 
171 



XIII 

THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

It was an Oriental custom to illus- 
trate the principles of truth by inci- 
dents from life, real or fictitious. 
Under which heading this tale falls, 
I leave the reader to decide. 

"Is my; smokestack on straight? 
And do you think my smoke smells 
just right ? It smells sooty to me, and 
of course noncombustion of soot must 
injure the lining membrane of the 
smokestack/' 

"Nonsense, Fussy, everybody but 
you knows a dredger can't smell its 
own smoke." 

The speakers were bringing to the 
surface, meantime, and depositing in 
adjacent scows, bucketfuls of Charles 
Eiver bottom. This was some twenty 
years ago. The time had long passed 
when for five cents you could buy a 
fresh lobster on West Boston Bridge 

172 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

and have it boiled on the spot, but the 
bridge was still wooden, and so low 
that if you looked over the rail on a 
still day you could see your face in 
the water. Even at high tide the 
Basin was navigated, except in the 
channel, only by rowboats, and by one 
high-sided, weatherbeaten sloop, once 
black. At low tide the channel itself 
was clogged, and the mudflats on the 
Cambridge side reached the backyard 
of Badger's Furniture Factory. 

Fussy was built in South Boston. 
Her only glimpse of the outside world 
was obtained on her way to the Basin, 
and that day the fog permitted only 
a fleeting view of Battery Wharf and 
Craigie Bridge. Even had there been 
more to see, it is doubtful if Fussy 
would have seen it, for she was mainly 
occupied in apprehension lest she be 
grazed by other craft, an experience 
peculiarly distasteful to her. Then, 
too, her mind was so constituted that 
every time she rubbed a pier to star- 

173 



PEG ALONG 

board she had to balance it by rubbing 
one to port, a somewhat engrossing 
occupation. Her real name was 
Susan B. Anthony, with curly cues, 
but she never could live up to that, so 
everybody just called her Fussy. Per- 
haps it was because her horizon was 
so limited that her thoughts were, per- 
force, directed inwards, or perhaps 
the attitude was dormant in her tim- 
bers, but nothing seemed to touch her 
vitally except her own sensations. 
The only interest she had in others 
was the question whether they were 
intending to insult, neglect, patronize, 
ridicule, or otherwise injure her. She 
was of the Dipper-Dredge family, a 
family made up of two of the oldest 
known to the arts, a fact early learned 
by Fussy, and never forgotten. Her 
working anatomy embodied little else 
than the dipper, the boom, two up- 
rights, a couple of drums, a boiler and 
a donkey engine. But about this sim- 
ple mechanism she had assembled the 

174 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

most varied sensations and an in- 
credible array of symptoms. 

Her friend Maria, the Philosophi- 
cal Dredger, was built at Bucksport, 
Maine. She was a Grappledredge, 
doubtless a lineal descendant of the 
original Grappledredge that exca- 
vated with Xerxes at Athos, all of 
which would have cut little figure with 
Maria if she had known it. She had 
blown her whistle in every fog, and 
weathered every gale that had visited 
the coast of Maine for decades. She 
once narrowly escaped being piled up 
on Nausset Beach, down Chatham 
way. Indeed, she had experienced 
enough by fire and water permanently 
to shake the nerve of any but the natu- 
rally well-balanced. From each ex- 
perience she had emerged unfussed, 
and yet without the arrogance which 
might have been excused in one of 
such achievement. She spent no time 
in self -analysis, in the study of mo- 
tives, or any other psychologic prob- 

175 



PEG ALONG 

lem, but was content to do her day's 
work and take her night's rest, with 
a large tolerance, meantime, for those, 
like her friend Fussy, incapable of 
this simple adjustment of life's duties. 

4 * Well, it smells sooty to me," per- 
sisted Fussy. " Anyway, whether it 
smells right or not it feels funny, or 
rather I can't seem to feel it at all. 
I am afraid my senses are becoming 
dulled." 

"Why, Fussy," said Maria, as she 
hove herself half out of the water to 
deposit an unusually large clutcher- 
ful, "yesterday you worrited because 
you did feel your smoke." 

"If I could only feel it to-day as I 
did yesterday," wailed Fussy, "I 
wouldn't care how it felt; anything 
would be better than this absence of 
sensation, this feeling that the smoke 
is going through my smokestack with- 
out my feeling it at all ! It is abso- 
lutely uncanny. I wonder if this is 
the way it feels to die?" 

176 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

"What extrawd'n'ry ideas you 
have, Fussy," interpolated Alger- 
non. "You seem to be on the lookout 
for trouble all the time, don't you 
know." 

Algernon was the dude dredger 
from London, a Suctiondredge, of 
metal throughout, and working noise- 
lessly, except for the gentle purr of 
well-adjusted machinery running 
"smooth." With his polished nose 
buried in the silt he would grub up 
the food that only a dredger can as- 
similate, pass it through a long metal 
tube supported by buoys on the sur- 
face of the water, and deposit it on 
the other side of the Embankment 
wall at the projected site of the In- 
stitute of Technology. 

Algernon was certainly a triumph 
of mechanical art. Every inch of his 
machinery glistened in the sunlight. 
Even his two hundred feet of intes- 
tine were well-groomed. Just why 
such an up-to-date dredger should 

12 177 



PEG ALONG 

have left his native land was a ques- 
tion yet unsolved. Unkindly critics 
said it was because he choked on an 
umbrella-rib one day, threw in his 
reverse, and plugged the channel with 
perfectly good loam ! 

The fact that Algernon had sown 
his wild oats in this reckless manner 
or had perhaps been guilty of even 
greater breaches of decorum, Fussy 
was all too ready to overlook. Indeed, 
I blush to state that his hazy past only 
added a dash of spite to the romantic 
favor with which she viewed him. In 
fact Fussy had somewhere in her 
mechanism a very soft spot for the 
dude dredger from London, although 
she took a morbid pleasure in hiding 
her feelings under a forbidding ex- 
terior of knotty planking. 

Not that Fussy realized how crude 
her aspect was. She sat too low to 
get a good view of herself in the 
water. It is quite probable that even 
if she could have gotten the clearest 

178 



TILE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

view in the world she wouldn't have 
seen herself just as outsiders did. The 
mind has an angle of incidence of its 
own quite irrespective of the laws of 
light, a fact observed by Aesop some 
time ago. And as the timid hare of 
the fable, on seeing his whiskers in the 
water, turned, with dire result, to 
meet the hounds, perhaps Fussy 's 
peep over the side would have re- 
vealed to her something resembling 
the lines of a clipper ship or an 
ocean-going yacht. 

No one but her friend Maria knew 
of Fussy 's social and amorous im- 
aginings. Maria alone knew that the 
object of Fussy 's apparently pur- 
poseless habit of creeping sidewise in 
defiance of wind and tide was to in- 
terpose her engine-house between 
Algernon and the garbage pail. 

Algernon's remark was quite too 
much for Fussy, and she exclaimed 
with a pout which made everyone 
jump within hearing, " That's right, 

179 



PEG ALONG 

nobody likes me, nobody wants me 
'round. I Ve a good mind to stick my 
dipper in the mud and break it off — 
then perhaps someone will be sorry." 

"Did it ever occur to you, Fussy/' 
said Maria, "that other people had 
somethin' else on their minds besides 
decidin' whether they wanted you 
'round or not ? What Algy says reely 
has nothin' to do with you; he don't 
care any more abaout you than he 
does abaout the next stray dory that 
drifts through Harvard Bridge. And 
jest why should he? He is probably 
thinkin' more abaout how his tail 
looks, this minute, than he is abaout 
how you are feelinV 

This was a rather harsh speech for 
Maria, and after a time she resumed 
in a more conciliatory tone : 

"What was the matter last night, 
Fussy, I thought you seemed a little 
oneasy?" 

"Why, it began with my pulse," 
said Fussy, foregoing the pleasure of 

180 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

harboring a grudge in the joy of air- 
ing a grievance. " You know it beats 
loud enough anyway to keep half the 
people awake in Back Bay, but last 
night it kept growing louder and 
louder, and faster and faster, and I 
heard a singing in my engine-room, 
and saw specks before my indicator. 
Then I got to thinking about the 
abrasion on the lip of my dipper, and 
I grew so hot I thought my boiler- 
head would fly out, then I felt some- 
thing cold creep all the way up and 
down my keel. It is a wonder I slept 
at all — Don't I smell something 
septic V J 

' ' Ain 't this what you smell % ' ' asked 
Maria, dexterously extricating a kit- 
ten from her clutcher. 

"Well, perhaps it is," allowed 
Fussy with a disappointed air. 

"All your lip wants is a little 
filin V ' continued Maria, "and I guess 
the singin' in your engine-room was 
jest Bill Tucker." 

181 



PEG ALONG 

Bill Tucker was the hardy tar who 
hove the coal, and, in times of stress, 
the lead, for Fussy 's manoeuvres. 
For these duties his seamanship was 
adequate though his instincts were 
really Alpine rather than nautical, 
since he was born in the Appalachian 
Chambers, Boxbury. 

" And as for the specks before your 
indicator, " continued Maria, "I'll bet 
a dory them was only June bugs. ' ' 

" There, that reminds me," said 
Fussy, " I know I dropped a bug off 
my last load and it is about me some- 
where — do you know whether the ap- 
pendix is to port or starboard?" 

"No, I don't," said Maria de- 
cidedly, "and what's more, I don't 
want to. "What you need, Fussy is a 
little less interspection!" 

1 1 Intussusception !" exclaimed 
Fussy, in a panic, "Do you think I've 
got that?" 

"You'd oughter take a lesson," re- 
sponded Maria, "from a susceptible 

182 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

old man dredger I onct knowed, that 
learnt himself how to cure his love 
fevers. He was always gettin' stuck 
on a new scow, and when she was 
towed out to sea he 'd go into a decline. 
Finally he declined so's I begun to get 
worrited abaout him, but one day he 
chirked up and told me that he had 
got all over the scow business. He 
said that now jest as soon as one scow 
left him he began right off to think of 
another scow, and so he kept himself 
middlin' comfortable all the time. 
Now, Fussy, when you get to thinkin' 
of your inner ds you jest start thinkin ' 
of some thin ' else — perhaps it 
wouldn't be quite safe in your case to 
think of some other innerd, neither, 
but why not try thinkin ' of some bit 
of outside bric-a-brac, like that new 
delivery wagon of R. H. White's V 9 

"How can I think of anything else 
besides my inwards, as you call them, 
when they keep troubling me," ob- 
jected Fussy. 

183 



PEG ALONG 

"It's the other way round/ ' re- 
joined Maria, "ef you stop thinkin' of 
'em they'll quit botherin' you. You 
worritin' people don't seem to mind 
so much when you're reely ailin'. 
You don't care at all ef your donkey 
engine kicks out a cylinder head, and 
you're only jest proud of a bandaged 
beam or a varicose steampipe, but you 
fret yourself 'most to death abaout 
the ontangible and improbable. You 
remind me of the coastin' schooner 
that was afraid she'd marry an ocean 
liner and have twin propellers; — 
For Heaven's sake, what's the matter 
now, Fussy?" 

Maria was startled into this inquiry 
by a spasmodic chugging which pro- 
ceeded from Fussy 's engine-room, 
from which emerged also Bill Tucker 
to look for external evidence of dis- 
order. Finding nothing tangible, he 
returned, but the trouble persisted. 
Fussy 's dipper would start smoothly 
enough on its downward course only 

184 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

to come to a standstill, hover over the 
surface of the water, then rise with a 
jerk, only to come again to a stand- 
still, the chug, meantime, becoming 
more and more insistent. 

"Why," explained Fussy in a quer- 
ulous tone, "I am not sure whether 
we are doing this work right or, in 
fact, whether we ought to be doing it 
at all. First I think it is none of 
my business, and let my dipper go, 
then it comes over me that perhaps I 
ought to be making it my business, and 
I can 't seem to bring myself to let it go 
into the water — then I think I am fool- 
ish and let it go again, and the more I 
think of it the less I can decide. 9 ' 

"What's the use of deciding " re- 
marked Maria. "I think you do alto- 
gether too much deciding Fussy. And 
you are too dead sot on havin' every- 
thin' you do come out right. Ef you 
only do every other thing right you 
will accomplish more than ef you 
don't do nothin' at all, and that is 

185 



PEG ALONG 

where you are goin' to land ef you 
don't look out. Keep a' dipping 
that's my motto. And it keeps me out 
of a heap of trouble, too." 

Whether as a result of this good 
advice or because Bill Tucker tight- 
ened a nut, Fussy was shortly working 
smoothly. A long silence followed, 
broken finally by Algernon, soliloquiz- 
ing: " America has done very well in 
literature and statesmanship. Every 
one has heard of Josh Billings and 
Buffalo Bill. Indeed they think well 
of them on the other side, but when it 
comes to mechanics you must allow 
that England has the weather gauge." 

"You remind me, Algy," inter- 
posed Maria, "of a new-fangled ma- 
chine they towed down to Skulpin 
P'int one time from New York. He 
had a good deal to say abaout how 
much better they did things to New 
York than in the state o' Maine, and 
we never could rightly understand 
why he left New York at all, till we 

186 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

found he'd a habit of kind er swal- 
lerin' himself when he struck hard 
bottom, and gittin' so mixed up he 
didn't know whether he was afloat or 
ashore, and that's why they shucked 
him off onto the Maine coast. 

" An ocean-goin' tug onct told me," 
she continued, "abaout a friend o' 
his that put in his time towin' coal 
barges round Bologny harbor. He 
was so top-heavy over bein' built in 
England that he got a list to port they 
never could set straight. He was the 
most sot old Britisher you ever see. 
It most broke his heart to have to 
wear a sign that he was to let for so 
many francs a day. He never could 
seem rightly to sense the fact that a 
franc was abaout the same as a shil- 
ling and when anybody told him et 
was, he'd jest squirt a stream o' bilge- 
water to lewart and say them bally 
languages got his goat — and he'd been 
in Bologny ever sence he could re- 
member. I never could see why a ma- 

187 



PEG ALONG 

chine should be so powerful proud of 
comin' from a country he ain't smart 
enough to stay in." 

"Oh dear/' said Fussy, hearing a 
low rumble in the distance, "there is 
a thunderstorm coming." 

"Why, you aren't afraid of thun- 
der, are you?" asked Algernon. 

"Of course not," said Fussy indig- 
nantly, "but electricity has a peculiar 
effect on me. It makes my dipper 
cold and clammy, and it chokes up my 
pipes so that I can't even whistle." 

"That ain't electricity," said 
Maria, "that's plain scairt to death. 
I had the same feelin' myself in the 
rollers off ISTausset in the big storm, 
and there warn't enough electricity 
'round to kill a shote. Try and f ergit 
it, Fussy." 

"Do you want me to believe there is 
no danger in a thunderstorm?" asked 
Fussy indignantly. 

"Wal, no," said Maria, "I don't 
know's I do, but I calculate there's 

188 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

more or less danger everywheres all 
the time. We'll never be jest safe, I 
s'pose, till we're on the scrap heap, 
but that's no reason for puttin' off 
livin' till we're dead. The only way 
to make livin' easy is to keep yer mind 
easy. And yer mind ain't nowheres 
near easy when you're scairt half to 
death; so I've kinder made up my 
mind ter cultivate a little kerridge in- 
stead er runnin' away every time, es- 
pecially from things that kin run 
faster 'n I kin." 

"But you wouldn't want to take a 
chance of being killed, would you?" 

"Wal, I don't know but I would 
when I couldn't help myself," said 
Maria, "you've got to take some 
chances. No one ever accomplished 
anythin' in this world without takin' 
some chances. And ef you're goin' to 
take 'em it's a waste of time to talk 
abaout 'em. Ef some of us would 
chew gravel more and the rag less, 
we'd accomplish jest as much, and I 

189 



PEG ALONG 

b'lieve when we'd onct got used to it 
we'd have jest abaout as good a time." 

"My word," observed Algernon, 
"that would make a jolly good motto, 
don 't you know. Chew gravel ! Raw- 
ther neat, eh ? The idea is that when 
you are chewing gravel you cawn't be 
chewing rags, for you cawn't be 
chewing two things at the same time, 
can you now?" 

" You 're quick as a cat, ain't you 
Algy, ' ' said Maria. ' ' I don 't know as 
I ever see any one spryer to ketch an 
idee." 

" Please don't make fun of Alger- 
non," whispered Fussy. "He ex- 
pressed it beautifully even if he 
didn't think of it first, and if you'd 
given him time I am sure he would 
have thought of it before you did. I 
believe you are jealous of him just be- 
cause he is a Britisher, as you call it. 
Anyway, I don't chew the rag. I'd 
rather be accused of anything than 
chewing the rag. You know very well 

190 



THE HYPOCHONDRIACAL DREDGER 

that is the one thing I can't stand be- 
ing accused of, and yet you are always 
telling me I do it. Or if you don't 
say it in so many words you refer to 
it in such a way that it is plain enough 
you mean me, and it is very unkind 
to imply a thing you won't say di- 
rectly. Not that you wouldn't accuse 
me directly of it if you wanted to, but 
what I mean is that I wouldn't mind 
it so much if you did, but whether you 
accuse me of it directly or indirectly 
I don't do it at all. So you ought not 
to accuse me of it." 

"All right," said Maria, "let it 
go at that. I find ef I use up my steam 
discussin' sech questions I don't have 
enough left to heist the clutcher." 

And Algernon, outwardly preserv- 
ing his habitual air of detachment 
from immediate surroundings, chuc- 
kled into his suction pipe. 

"Well, anyway," said Pussy, "my 
smoke does feel funny, and my floor 
timbers are boggy, and my " 

191 



PEG ALONG 

At this point the super came along- 
side in a dory. 

" How's she running Bill?" he in- 
quired. 

"Same as ever," said Bill, "she 
seems to rattle some, but I don't see 
as she runs any different to what she 
did forty years ago." 

"Did you hear that, Fussy?" asked 
Maria. "Now you'd better stop 
worritin' and try the gravel business 
a spell." 

"Well, if I am all right," persisted 
Fussy, "I'd like to have him explain 

" but just then the whistle blew 

for six o'clock, and Fussy 's steam was 
shut off. Silence fell on the Basin, 
unbroken save for an occasional grunt 
from Maria, a well-bred sniff from 
Algy, and a gentle croak from Fussy, 
which she was sure was abnormal. 
Soon nothing was heard but the gentle 
lapping of the waves, that seemed 
gleefully to continue the refrain : 

Keep a' dippin^. 
192 



INDEX 

A 

PAGE 

Annoyances, measured by mental atti- 
tude 163 et seq. 

Approbativeness, as an aid in emotional con- 
trol 97 

illustrated 94 

in the restaurant 91 

Johnson on 87 

lessening with age 94 

phrenology catering to 89 

Stevenson on 92 

Aristotle, on work 152 

B 

Bacon, a worker 33 

on despatch 150 

on detail 37 

on emotional poise 40 

on living in the past , 39 

on mind-management 40 

on plants 37 

on respect 35 

on revenge 38 

on travel 35 

Brain-cells, compared to stars 27 et seq. 

Brain fag, caused by monotony 161 

Butler, on fret 100 

C 

Call, Annie Payson, en fear of the dentist 143 

Carlyle, on work 32 

Chesterton, on playing the martyr 117 

13 193 



INDEX 

PAGE 

Courage, cultivation of 20, 109, 116 

Montaigne on 116 

Cowper, on bashf ulness 87 

Custom, why conform to 59, 72 

D 

Delusions, of persecution 121 

systematic 123 

E 

Emotional control, Epictetus on 168 

fashion in 165 

Jonson on 168 

Wilberf orce on 169 

Epictetus, on moral courage 61 

on passion 168 

on self-command 46 

on training out insistence 61 

F 

Faulty habits, advantage of correcting. . 51 et seq. 

complete cure not to be expected 54 

first step is to recognize 53 

keeping score of 47 et seq. 

Fears, illustrated 108, 109, 110 et seq. 

retrospective 115 

Firmness of purpose, not necessarily obsessive. 82 

Franklin, on conquering faults 42 

on sleep 79 

Fret, Butler on 100 

conjugal 101 

illustrated 103 

maxim for 103 

origin of, sometimes worthy 104 

selfishness in 105 

G 

Gay, John, on life a jest 81 

194 



INDEX 

H PAGE 

Habits, drifting into obsessions 64 

Horace, on living in the present 129 

on play 161 

I 

Ibsen, on work 149 

Impatience, on the telephone 105 

in the subway 106 

Insistence, not always objectionable .... 83 et seq. 

Intolerance for suggestion 66 

Invalid, the cheerful 101 

Invalids do not always want to get well 67 

t 

J 

Johnson, Samuel, on self -consciousness 87 

on work as antidote for worry 153 

Jonson, Ben, on attitude toward praise 168 

K 
Kingsbury, on the martyr 118 

L 

Living in the past, illustrated 133 et seq. 

futility of 131 et seq. 

Living in the present, Horace on 129 

Omar Khayyam on 145 et seq. 

Living in the future, to certain extent desirable. 140 

when wrong 142 et seq. 

M 

Manic-depressive insanity 170 

Martyrdom, self-inflicted, Kingsbury on 118 

Maxim, for " chewing the rag," 24 

for doubting folly 23 

for overestimating trifles 57 

the gist of philosophy 23 

195 



INDEX 

PAGE 

Mind, physical basis of 25 

Mind-management, compared with boat-sailing 18 

Montaigne, on courage 116 

N 

New England conscience, a stumbling block . . . 138 

illustrated 139 



Obsession, defined 63 

illustrated 58, 63, 74, 80, 81, 107 

Omar Khayyam 145 et seq. 

Ordway, Thomas, on pursuit of peace 108 

Over-insistence, illustrated (see Obsession) 

in the parent 68 

mechanism of 62 

P 

Paranoia 121 

dangerous 124 

illustrated 121, 125 

probably inherent 126 

Parkhurst, on living by oneself 119 

Play, Horace on 161 

not to be made too easy 159 

S 

Scott, Sir Walter, as a youth 11 

on work 157 

Self -consciousness (see Approbativeness) 

Sleep, Franklin's custom regarding 79 

Justinian's custom regarding 79 

Solicitude for others sometimes selfish 115 

Stevenson, on custom 72 

on emotional poise 162 

on youth 92 

196 



INDEX 

V PAGE 

Vacation 161 

W 

Wilberf orce, on emotional control 169 

Work, Aristotle on 152 

as antidote for worry 150 

interrupted to advantage 156 

Johnson on 153 

not to be too sharply defined 158 

Scott on 157 



